


5 Times Tony Hesitated to Touch Peter and 1 Time He Didn't

by notapartytrick, TheOceanIsMyInkwell



Series: Knock the Ice from My Bones [1]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies)
Genre: Adoption, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Dead May Parker (Spider-Man), Eating Disorders, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Howard Stark's Bad Parenting, Hurt Peter Parker, Hurt/Comfort, Panic Attacks, Peter Parker Gets a Hug, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Platonic Cuddling, Precious Peter Parker, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Touch-Starved, You better believe it, omg there is so much hurt/comfort, our bois may be idiots but they end up hugging so much
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-02
Updated: 2019-12-23
Packaged: 2021-02-17 23:08:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 28,262
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21651265
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notapartytrick/pseuds/notapartytrick, https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheOceanIsMyInkwell/pseuds/TheOceanIsMyInkwell
Summary: Peter tugs a hand through his unruly hair, eyebrows drawn together, and finally meets Tony’s gaze. “Mister Stark, I think we’re both on the wrong page. Like, at least six pages away from each other. I don’t think you’ve even read my… page.”Humouring the clumsy metaphor, Tony levels with the cryptic kid. “You wanna read it for me?”“Yeah. I’m not – I’m actually…” he pauses to swipe his lips with his tongue. “I probably seem nervous here because I wannastayhere. I just… I guess I’m scared of messing up? I really don’t – don’t want you to…”Leave me.The wordblindsidedpales in comparison to what Tony’s feeling.That’s not – I can’t believe I… Oh my God.It’s a struggle to hang on to his veneer of snarky calm. “Right. Well, I’m gonna take the liberty of telling you that you’re way off base.”--Or, Peter suffers yet another loss of a loved one and he and Tony must navigate their way around their fears and their tentative love for each other in the aftermath.Co-authored by theoceanismyinkwell and notapartytrick.
Relationships: May Parker (Spider-Man) & Peter Parker, Pepper Potts/Tony Stark, Peter Parker & Tony Stark
Series: Knock the Ice from My Bones [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2076474
Comments: 373
Kudos: 1033





	1. What Made You? Maybe You Know

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What is up my duuuudes! It has been a hot minute (five months shh) since the last time I (theoceanismyinkwell) posted a fic, mostly due to school and work and personal stuff going on. But now Daisy (notapartytrick) and I are hitting y'all with our absolute baby of a project that has been in the works for so long: five times Tony hesitated to touch Peter and one time he didn't. We wondered, what would happen if a grieving, touch-starved Peter moved in with Tony, and Tony had to learn how to show physically affection to his new spider-son? This whole fic explores just that.
> 
> As a heads-up, this fic deals with grief/mourning, a description of a panic attack, a detailed conversation about an eating disorder, vague descriptions of a physical injury, and internal monologues about touch starvation and touch aversion. However, we promise you that this fic will have a happy ending--or at least as happy as it can get with the loss of May Parker.
> 
> I wrote chapters 1, 3 and 5, and Daisy wrote 2, 4 and 6. Our posting schedule will be solidly twice a week, every Monday/Tuesday and Friday/Saturday.
> 
> Enjoy!!
> 
> Theme song for this chapter: ["To You Alone" (acoustic version) by Tom Rosenthal](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JFjEphoP1G8)

People die every day. Tony knows this.

They die from car accidents, falls, substance overdose, strokes. Shootings. Homicides. Natural causes. Unnatural ones. Slow, terminal illnesses with family already mourning around them in their last days. Or quietly in their sleep, having lived to a ripe old age, perhaps alone in a nursing home somewhere but as satisfied as they’ll ever be with the decades they’ll leave behind them. Or--or--and this is the one that gets Tony every time--the sudden blips of fate that just happen in the middle of the goddamn day.

Like the slip of the coffee mug from your hand when you’re having a perfectly normal morning.

Like the twisted ankle that gets you on a Tuesday afternoon on your way back up the same driveway from the same mailbox you check every day.

Like the lurch of your heart behind your ribs just a second too late after you realize you missed a step and now you’re hurtling into uncertainty instead of your usual trip to the basement to fetch the laundry.

None of these things are fatal, and yet.

And yet.

The rage they bring at the sheer _inexplicability_ and _pointlessness_ of it all is a touch too familiar. Tony knows it, too, the moment he finds himself in the middle of tying a perfect Windsor knot in the mirror and wondering if Peter next door is going to need help with his own tie in a minute.

His first thought: Peter’s first time wearing a tie shouldn’t have to be like this.

His second thought: No, is it his first time? Wait. He doesn’t know. Shit. He has no clue.

And the third: It may still very well be his first time tying one on his own. Or at least trying to.

The clouds shift abruptly away from the sun, and the beams spill in through the window unchecked. Inconsiderate. Tony feels his hands shake, because how _fucking_ dare it be July?

People die every day. Tony knows this.

And yet somehow, people never show in the movies the sweltering heat at the funeral, the indescribable sacrilegious feeling of attendees in short sleeves or no sleeves at all, the low-grade buzzing of insects outside that only serve as another cheap reminder of how incredibly short and how fucking _random_ life is.

In the movies, people always die in winter. Or the coolness of a rainy season, or at least the decency of a time when it’s still manageable to wear a full suit and tie.

Because how could anyone in real life deal with actually dreading summer in their memories instead of the universally detested snow and mud and freezing cold?

Peter’s suddenly there, hovering at the threshold of Tony’s bedroom. It turns out he does know how to tie a tie on his own: poorly. Tony crosses the few steps between them without a thought, but as he reaches up a hand to tighten the knot and straighten the fabric, he finds his own muscles hesitating.

Better to leave it like that, though for the life of him he doesn’t know why.

His hand doesn’t know what to do. It’s poised over Peter’s shoulder now, too wary, too long.

“I was just checking if Happy was coming, because I didn’t see the car from the other window,” Peter says without preamble.

Tony flexes his hand that’s still in the air and ends up cracking his knuckles as he brings his fist back down to his side. “Nope. We’re taking a different car.” At the slight squint of Peter’s right eye, Tony clarifies, “I’m driving. Happy’s coming on his own.”

There was a time it would have been appropriate to touch Peter. Back at the hospital, in the vending machine room when Peter started crying silently for the first time that night because the little pack of Famous Amos cookies got stuck between the shelf and the glass on its way down. Tony had moved to catch him, embrace him, but Peter had shifted in the opposite direction at the exact same second and made his way jerkily to one of the sticky vinyl chairs on the other side of the room. Tony had definitely dropped the ball on that moment. Because the longer he’d stood there watching the moisture stream quietly from Peter’s eyes and did nothing except mutter “It’s okay, kid, let it out, let it out. It’s gonna be okay,” the chance to hug him flew farther and farther away. And now the minutes had stretched into hours into days, and still Tony had failed to follow through with any physical contact. Not for lack of desire, but--something else.

And Peter certainly hadn’t asked.

\--

Tony supposes he could at least credit himself for reaching into the vending machine to snag the offending pack of cookies and handing it to Peter. Peter had taken it with a voiceless mouthing of _thanks_ , opened it and proceeded to chew through it with a wet and methodical crunch, timed with the hitch in his lungs, that sometimes still haunts Tony to this day.

\--

If there’s anything that simultaneously awes and horrifies Tony about Peter, it’s the kid’s ability to act as if nothing happened at all.

It’s not an act. Peter has always been too bad of a liar for that. What worries Tony more is that it’s real, that it’s actually a product of Peter’s denial--dissociation--God, he doesn’t know. Most of the bad things begin with D.

“You know, most kids don’t do Calc II problems for fun on a Sunday night in the middle of”--he winces to himself--“July.”

“Thanks, Mr. Stark,” Peter says, as he reaches for the outstretched glass without looking and closes his hand around the iced tea. He scrubs at the graphing paper for a few more seconds before setting down his pencil and taking a long draught. Finally he raises his gaze to meet Tony’s.

“I’m not most kids, you know. The whole web-spinning and gymnastics on skyscrapers kinda cancels that out.”

Tony offers a quiet snort. He slouches forward on one elbow on the table and leans over to peer at Peter’s notebook. “What are you working on, anyway?”

A beat of silence. Peter shifts just a centimeter away. It’s subtle, but in the quiet of the dining room away from the hum of the bots and in light of the nameless guilt that screams constantly at the forefront of Tony’s mind, it’s all too palpable.

“This Calc II reviewer May bought me from Good Will before she--” Peter rubs his thumb against the bit of plastic that’s peeling off the corner of textbook cover and switches tack in the same breath. “--before the end of the semester. We both thought it would be good to, uh, y’know. Go through it before I go to college. Or something.”

“Or something,” Tony repeats, not without audible fondness. “So. Plowing randomly through parabolas on a summer night. That’s--that’s definitely something.”

“Hngh.”

“Building bots get too boring for you?” Tony knows the answer to this already. He knows it. But he’s grasping at something, anything, to close the distance that he never knew had sprouted between the two of them, but is undeniable to him now.

“Doesn’t feel right,” Peter mutters.

Tony’s not sure he heard the kid correctly. “Come again?”

The boy repeats, still mumbling but a little louder, and ever refusing to look directly at him: “Doesn’t feel right.”

“Huh. Guess I heard you right the first time.” Tony hooks a foot around the nearest dining chair to slide it closer to himself and plops down. He kicks a bit back and forth, playing a futile kind of footsie against the scuffed toes of Peter’s converse. The boy kicks back lightly, once, and then grows still again.

Tony raises a brow. Folds his arms and shoots Peter a look when the latter refuses to speak. “So,” he prompts him. “Care to...unpack that?”

“I don’t, like, I mean…” Peter drops his head into his hands, obscuring his face completely.

“Hey,” Tony says softly. His vocal cords suddenly feel rough and unused. “Hey. Hey, hey, hey. It’s okay. I’m sorry I pushed.” He dips his head down, goading Peter into looking up to meet his eyes, but the boy stolidly fixes his gaze on the tiled floor.

“It doesn’t feel right because I...because building robots and designing stuff and--all that. I was doing all that when things were…”

Tony can almost hear him swallow. The man suddenly finds the tabletop extremely interesting. He digs his thumbnail into the crack of the joint on surface and scrapes along it, back and forth.

“...Things were okay.”

Tony hears his own voice emerge as if it’s no longer his own. It’s soft, impossibly soft. Since when was he capable of such gentleness?

“I get that,” he whispers.

Peter snaps the calc reviewer shut and starts shuffling it back and forth across the table between his hands. “Mr. Stark?”

“Yeah?”

“When your--when she…”

“...When my mom died?” Tony fills in for him.

The overgrown locks at Peter’s nape rasp against the cotton of his t-shirt as he nods vigorously. He opens and closes his mouth a couple of times, but nothing else comes out.

“I didn’t do much building either, kid. If that’s what you’re asking me. I mean, technically you could say I did, but I was blowing up more robots than I was creating them. Rhodey and me--we almost fought one day when he came in and found me drunk off my ass and surrounded by piles of junk metal. I don’t know, that’s what he told me went down. I dunno. I mean, I believe him. ’Course I do. I just...don’t remember. He was worried out of his mind about me, because he never knew me to be the type to just smash or set fire to stuff I’d designed from scratch.”

Peter slides the reviewer farther down the table until it reaches Tony. The man halts its trajectory with the flat of his palm, then pushes it back. They continue playing their weird version of badminton with the battered calc book for what seems to stretch into several minutes, the only noise around them being the imperceptible hum of FRIDAY’s speakers and the blue lights above.

Tony can almost feel the shudder in Peter’s lungs when the kid breathes again. When did he ever stop?

“I built a lot when Uncle Ben died,” Peter whispers. His tone is so shaky that Tony feels the sudden urge to scream at the stars for what they’ve done to the brilliance of this boy. “I--I built robots, or like, what I thought could count as robots. That’s when I started dumpster diving and going through computer junk shops and stuff. It was kinda addicting, actually. Ned was happy, though, ’cause for about a month straight he said I didn’t process anything. Like a zombie or something. He was so fricking happy he even gave me fifty bucks to keep buying scrap materials.”

“I remember.”

Peter’s head jerks a little in his direction at that. Tony doesn’t elaborate--there’s no need to, when Peter’s sharp brain can put the pieces together and come to the conclusion that Tony and May had been talking privately far more than they let on.

“You think it was a distraction?” Tony prods.

The kid shrugs. “It kept me up at night with something to do other than remember… _it_ , over and over again. ’Cause trying to sleep didn’t erase those images anyway.”

Tony swallows. Neither of them are strangers to PTSD: different brands, different triggers, both chasing the elusive cloud of sleep at the same time that they curse it.

“So I dunno why I can’t build now,” Peter goes on. “It’s what I used to do. It’s the only thing I _could_ do, back then, like, fixing things. Creating something instead of ruining it, or rather, uh, being able to bring something back to life--” Abruptly he stops. 

Half a beat later, Tony hears the sharp intake of breath.

No. _No, no. No no no no don’t even go there_ \--

But Peter does.

He utters, “Oh,” like the tragic solution to a Rubik’s cube, like the long-lost ending line to a eulogy returned too late, and the ring of his voice falls like glass.

Tony could swear he’s acquired superhuman hearing. The feel of their heartbeats is hot and oppressive in the air between them. What does he do? He hates this silence where Peter stews with the unknown depths of his shame, but he hates the talking even more when all the lies and self-blame come spewing out of the boy’s mouth.

What does he do? _What does he do?_

“ _Peter_ ,” Tony says, slow and sad. And that’s when everything comes bubbling to the surface.

Probably the worst of it all is that Peter still doesn’t make a sound as he cries. The tears come hot and fast and they patter on the mahogany table--like the disjointed rhythm of the strange storm that comes while the summer sun still burns in the sky, and it makes you wonder what angel died that God had to break the forecast and scream His grief at the earth--but hardly a sob escapes Peter’s chest. His shoulders quake, and God, he looks so thin, so _young_ , no--so aged before his time. The thought crosses Tony’s mind: how many nights and weeks and years and lifetimes has this boy wept from loss that he’s finally learned to keep his peace as he grieves?

Tony wants him to scream. He wants to grab the kid by the shoulders and yell at him to let it out, to throw shit at the wall and storm off and take out his anger on the new tentative father figure in his life who he has every right to fear may not be around for much longer.

Peter drags a wrist across his nose with a sniffle. “I’m sorry,” he croaks.

“Don’t be.”

“No. I mean.” His breath hitches. “I’m sorry I couldn’t bring her back to life.” And then he buries his face in the crook of his arm against the table.

It’s the most mind-blowingly _irrational_ kind of apology Tony has ever heard, and yet, and yet--something scares him to the very depths of his bones about the way each word resonates with him. The way it makes sense.

What does he do?

“Pete?” Tony glances down at Peter’s right hand, the one still lying loosely on top of the math book on the table. His heart lurches with his hesitation. He could count two beats, four, five, and then he finally makes his decision and reaches for the kid’s hand.

It’s cold. Shockingly so. And so small, with an untold strength that he can sense in those fingers, but so heart-breakingly small. Peter doesn’t miss a beat and immediately curls his hand back around Tony’s.

It takes another five minutes for the trembling in Peter’s shoulders to subside. In all those five minutes, Tony doesn’t dare loosen his grip on Peter’s hand. Neither does the kid let go.

Peter's t-shirt rustles as his head moves. He's unburied his face from his arm and turned it to rest on his cheek instead. When he blinks up at Tony, the sheen of the wetness over his eyes is blinding.

“Mr. Stark?”

Tony blinks back. His gaze is transfixed on the steady drip of tears from the corner of Peter's eye across the bridge of his nose and into his hairline.

“Yeah, Pete?”

“Thanks.”

“I'm sorry, kid.” He doesn't know why he says it, but something makes him certain it needs to be said.

More moisture glistens in the upturned path of gravity along Peter's cheek.

The tiniest of shrugs.

“S'okay.”

“No, it's not.” Tony squeezes Peter's hand ever so gently and wonders why they've never held each other like this before. “But it will be.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments are the stuff that butter our croissant so please spread the love <3 Thank you so, so much for reading! -Kaleb (theoceanismyinkwell)


	2. Don't Deserve Your Love But You Give It To Me Anyway

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony sighs, changes tack. “Look, I’m not gonna make you invite all your friends to Chuck-E-Cheese, but… she’d want you to enjoy yourself. I know it’s hard, but – this is your day. What do you wanna do with it?”  
> And that was how the two of them found themselves alone in the Tower’s expansive kitchen that evening, attempting a recipe for lemon chicken pasta.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello my lovelies! It's me, the mysterious co-writer of this fic... notapartytrick/Daisy! I am absolutely thrilled to present this fic to y'all and I hope you'll enjoy it as much as I enjoyed collaborating with my literal writing hero, theoceanismyinkwell (don't mind me gushing, just go read his stuff because he's amazing XD)
> 
> Fun fact: I wrote this chapter way back in the summer in a tiny AirBnb in Poland! 
> 
> Now sit back and enjoy the ride, mates :)
> 
> Theme song for this chapter: ["Don't Deserve You" by Plumb](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nqik0YECdsg) (Kaleb creates all the titles from song lyrics because he's a Genius, give it up for these song suggestions!!)

It's Peter's birthday tomorrow. It's Peter's birthday tomorrow and he hasn't breathed a word of it to Tony. It's Peter's birthday tomorrow and Tony's got _nothing_.

To tell the truth, he's never been a big birthday guy – what’s so exciting about being born? - but it's the kid’s sixteenth and missing his birthday would irrefutably make Tony a monster. You don't miss kids’ birthdays. You just _don't_.

Except planning ahead for a sweet 16th hasn't exactly been the most pressing matter on Tony's mind. It's not that Peter’s being a pain but the opposite: the kid seems to be under the impression that his mere existence is a painful inconvenience to Tony.

Plus, the whole grieving thing. He was allowed some time off school but within a week started begging Tony to let him go back. Tony suspects the only reason he pleaded was so he wouldn't be in the Tower all day - in other words, a burden - because the minute he comes home from school, he shuts himself in his room, only emerging if Tony calls him.

For Tony, May’s loss is anger. Simmering, seething. But for Peter, it's unbearable sadness.

Tony hasn't a clue what to do with it.

And then there's temporary guardianship and CPS and fixing him a room and getting healthy food in him and scheduling a haircut and dentist and buying new backpacks and clothes and toothbrushes and gym kits and textbooks and enforcing curfews and house rules and protocols and dealing with school reports and calls from the headmaster who sounds nauseatingly sympathetic as he talks of suggestions and referrals, and striking the balance between constructive discipline and loving comfort and hell, even ordering a parenting book so he can read that kind of crap in the hope he'll become adequate.

He gets deathly scared just thinking about it. _Parenting._

With Peter mostly holed up in his room, they haven't exactly been overwhelmed with quality bonding time, but Tony doesn't think that this is the only reason the kid’s birthday hasn't come up.

“Tomorrow?” he echoes dumbly to FRIDAY.

He has to fight the urge to deprogram her when she calmly states, “Yes,” as if the world hasn't just imploded.

“Shit,” Tony hisses vehemently. He's always known there is more to Peter then what he's currently seen, but never before has he been so blindingly reminded that he doesn't _really_ know this kid at all.

It's just past 2 AM and Peter, judging by his vitals, is asleep. For a split second, Tony considers barging into his room and confronting him, and makes it halfway to the door - before slapping a rough hand over his face and turning right back around.

For one, disturbing the kid’s already dire sleep schedule would be extremely counterproductive; by Friday's calculations he averages just under 3 hours a night, which Tony wouldn't wish on anyone, and now he's finally in dreamland, Tony's determined for him to stay there as long as possible. For another, banging down Peter’s door at 2 AM to ask about a birthday party is _not_ in alignment with the calm and reasonable home environment the stupid parenting book says is vital for teenagers to settle in.

So, in a moment he will later come to acknowledge is pretty damn monumental for him, Tony Stark decides to follow reason over instinct. He slides low in his desk chair, hand still over his face, aware that he's being dramatic. Something about blowing a situation out of proportion helps assuage the stress just a little.

_Okay, what the hell do I do?_

Calling Pepper is desperate and a gross exposure of his incompetence. Calling Rhodey would probably end either in his well-meaning friend advising him to get rid of the kid or playing some sort of prank – and again, the incompetence thing. Talking to Peter about it is already ruled out and the birthday is tomorrow. Ordering an overload of decorations and extravagant presents is the sort of thing he might do for someone who wasn’t a grieving orphan who is reluctant to accept even the scrambled eggs Tony makes on Saturday mornings.

His compromise is to tear a shred of squared paper from a pad and scrawl out a note.

**_Hi, kid. No, it’s not the Tooth Fairy, it’s Tony. FRIDAY told me it was your birthday tomorrow. Thanks for the heads-up._ **

_No, that’ll guilt-trip him._

**_Hi, kid. No, it’s not the Tooth Fairy, it’s Tony. FRIDAY told me it was your birthday tomorrow. ~~Thanks for the heads-up.~~ I understand you might not wanna do something huge, but it’s still a special day. Chat with me tomorrow about it, we can figure something out._ **

**_Love you_ **

_Nope. Too sappy. Way too sappy. Abort._

**_~~Love you~~ Happy birthday._ **

Tony slips the note under Peter’s door and waits for the sun.

\--

When Peter tiptoes into the kitchen that morning – Friday, August 10th, to be painstakingly precise as FRIDAY had been – Tony has to bite back a comment about the dreadful dark circles under the kid’s hooded eyes. He won’t pretend he hasn’t checked Peter’s sleep every night; tonight, he managed a measly 2 hours. How to bring it up is, as of yet, beyond him.

“I – uh…” Peter waves the slip of paper. “Got your note.”

“What do you think?” Tony asks, wondering if crossing his legs will look less intimidating to the teenager currently half-hidden behind the door. It’s 6am and yet he’s painfully alert.

Peter is silent for a while, fixing his eyes on the floor and swallowing. “Um… I – I don’t really know?”

“What do you mean?”

Again, Peter hesitates, still ducked behind the door as if he needs permission just to enter the room. Lost in the silence, Tony watches his bare toes curling into the floor tiles.

When Tony’s sure an hour must have passed and he’s tired of the awkward tension lingering in Peter’s distance and silence, he stiffly pats the couch beside him. “Come on. Spill.”

When the kid finally emerges from behind the wall, Tony sees the balled-up socks in his hand and can’t help closing his eyes briefly in amusement. He’s all but dressed for school and bends down with what looks like an apology written on his face to slip them on once he reaches the couch.

Tony prompts him gently once he’s straightened back up. “So.”

“So.”

_Okay, I’m gonna have to help him out._

“I’ve got nothing business-related today, so I’m around if you want to… do something.”

He swallows. Peter eyes him briefly before fixing his gaze back on his lap.

With a sigh, Tony changes approach. “Look, I’m not gonna make you invite all your friends to Chuck-E-Cheese, but… she’d want you to enjoy yourself. I know it’s hard, but – this is your day. What do you wanna do with it?”

And that was how the two of them found themselves alone in the Tower’s expansive kitchen that evening, attempting a recipe for lemon chicken pasta. “We used to make it together,” Peter had stated haltingly.

As Tony makes for the utensil drawer, Peter, who had been whirling away to the left, suddenly stops in his tracks; they collide awkwardly. Peter barely registers the impact, mind suddenly flooding to the brim with bittersweet recollections. Tony reaches for his shoulder to mutter a shitty apology – and pauses.

The kid is perfectly still, eyes locked on the lemon he clutches as if merely holding it is overwhelming. At that moment, Tony simply doesn’t have the guts to pull him back to his senses, instead ducking away until Peter slowly grinds back to life.

When they bump into each other a second time, Tony can’t help but say: “Don’t you have a… sense for this?”

Peter bites his lip. “Sort of? It’s not – it doesn’t always work. I don’t know why.” He shrugs sheepishly. “Sorry.”

Tony sighs in exasperation. “ _Kid._ ”

“What?”

 _You don’t need to apologize for not always having a super sense. Damn, that’s a weird sentence._ “Lemon squeezer’s right above you.”

“Oh. Thank you.”

Silence. Awful, awful silence, so thick Tony could swim through it.

“So.” Tony steels himself with a hard blink as he lowers a pan of water onto the hob. “How was school?”

His back is purposefully turned away from the kid to spare himself an unsavoury reaction, but Peter seems surprisingly happy he asked. “Uh…” he stalls. A gentle clang ascertains that he’s found the lemon squeezer and set it down.

“You don’t have to pretend you enjoyed it just to make me feel better,” Tony blurts before he can think.

The slow, serrated grate of Peter’s knife against the lemon pauses.

Tony realises he’s lingered by the now-bubbling pan for half a minute and reflexively grabs the first pack of pasta he can find in the overhead cupboard, which is also the _only_ pack – Tony’s really more of a Deliveroo Express guy, or at least he was before Peter joined him in the Tower and exposed his mentor’s dire eating habits.

“It wasn’t awful,” begins Peter hesitantly, the rhythmic pulling of the knife through the flesh of his lemon resuming at a marginally slower pace. “Ned and MJ are being great. But…” His knife is set aside with a clatter that’s just slightly too loud; Tony covers it by steadily pouring the penne into the pan, each hardened piece hitting the metal with a patter like synthetic rain.

A wet, pulpy sound ensues as Peter presumably twists the lemon half against the serrated dome of Tony’s old-school squeezer with tense vigour. “But it just doesn’t feel the same. Everyone keeps staring at me. The- the teachers either excuse me from, like, _everything_ , or give me a speech about prioritizing education or whatever. It’s- it’s… _different._ And I just want it all to go back to how it was before—”

With a spluttering spray, the lemon Peter had been aggressively squeezing explodes and leaves the kid and his corner of the kitchen finely coated in pulp and juice.

If they hadn’t just broached such a sombre topic, Tony might have laughed. Instead, he turns sharply to Peter, who has flinched back and now stares at the fragments of yellow skin he still grasps in a strange iteration of shock.

Tony’s first instinct is to grab a wet towel and help the stock-still teenager clean up the mess, and he’s halfway to pressing the cloth to Peter’s shirt when the kid – only infinitesimally, but enough that Tony notices – shies away from his touch. All of a sudden, his thoughts catch up with him. _Why would you do that? He’s worked up and now you’re invading his personal space. Back off._

He leaves the towel on the counter, motioning subtly for Peter to use it, and something shifts in the curve of Peter’s eyebrows that Tony chalks down to the aftershocks of his brief uncovering of raw memories. “Sorry,” he breathes, beginning to scrub at the walls and counter with an almost unsettling fervency. “Sorry, I’m so sorry.”

“It’s alright,” Tony manages to say with a frown that he quickly wipes away in favour of reassurance. “Hey, don’t bother. I can get someone to clean the room later.”

With his head bowed, Peter finishes his task and stammers: “Could – may I go and change?”

For a moment, Tony’s jaw simply hangs open.

“Yeah – of _course_ , Pete. You don’t have to ask.”

Peter simply swallows and walks out of the kitchen, leaving Tony to cradle his head in his hands. _I’ve got a lot of work to do._

\--

The hint of a smile he catches ghosting Peter’s face as a wave of citrus-tinted, earthen smell emerges from the open oven door is a victory.

“Is it done?” he asks the kid, who nods, giving him the green light to lift the old china dish they’d used for the pasta out of the oven and onto the stovetop to cool. He’s impressed by how well it turned out, but Peter had done almost everything save putting the pasta on to boil, leaving Tony’s rusty cooking skills no opportunity to screw up the meal. Tony had preferred to watch Peter whiz about the kitchen with more energy than he’d seen in the kid since he’d started staying over at the Tower. One new thing he’s learnt about Peter Parker: kid’s somewhat of a master chef.

Once Tony’s ladled their portions out into bowls, pointedly leaving the lion’s share for Peter and his enhanced metabolism, he pauses. “Where do you wanna have this? Should we switch on a movie?”

Peter briefly shuffles his feet as if his next words are making him inordinately nervous. “I think – can we just sit?” With his free hand, he indicates the barely-used table and chairs a couple of feet away.

“Oh. Yeah, of course.” Tony winces just a little at his over-enthusiastic compliance, and tacks on: “Your birthday.”

In response, Peter laughs, but it holds only a shell of amusement. _It’s a start._

They sit. Clearly, something is eating away at the kid, who wolfs down his meal in a bid to avoid conversation or, God forbid, eye contact. It’s mushy and _weird_ , but Tony’s missed his eyes.

Coaxing Peter to break his silence, he lets his fork drop into his bowl, folds his hands, setting his chin on top, and says: “Come on, this is dumb. What’s up?”

Peter swallows guiltily.

“Come on, kid. You know you’re bad at keeping secrets. And I…” He bites the inside of his cheek, bringing the words to the surface. “I’m here for you.”

In trepidation, Peter raises his head. Twists his hands in his lap – Tony can’t see them beneath the table, but he knows the kid well enough to know that, in his books, the situation would certainly call for hand-twisting. When he finally voices his thoughts, it’s with a wavering voice that strikes right through to Tony’s heart.

“Mister Stark, what’s gonna happen to me?”

And there it is; they are untethered.

This, _this_ , is the elephant of all elephants-in-the-room. The unconquerable, unsolvable problem that keeps him awake at night past the strongest sleep meds money can buy. The question mark that’s hung over his head since the very second he’d received the call that _May Parker has just passed away. You are listed as her nephew’s only emergency contact. Are you able to chaperone him until further arrangements can be organized as to Mister Parker’s guardianship?_

The question of _further arrangements._ What next?

He’s boiled it all down into logical points as if the kid’s future was simple, only theoretical. Peter has no family. Peter’s options are going into the care system or Tony. Care is not an option. Tony is _not_ an option.

Why? He could write a book.

Just how uncomfortable Peter seems in the Tower is a testimony to where he might prefer to be.

As the thought dawns upon Tony, his perverse mental puzzle finally fits together. It’s Peter’s decision to make. It pains him that the kid’s been thrust into a circumstance where he has to choose his own path, but if he was any good as a guardian, he’d _let him choose._

Except Tony’s not sure he’ll like what the answer will be. Because – _goddamnit, I like having Peter. I like him being around. I don’t care that he’s not himself. I want to try this for him._

Peter’s words echo with the clang of funeral bells through his mind. _“Mister Stark, what’s gonna happen to me?”_

Tony sucks in a breath, catches the kid’s eye.

“What do you want to happen?”

“Uh…” Peter is blindsided by the almost interrogatory manner in which Tony studies him. “What do you mean?”

“Where do you wanna go next? Because I don’t want anything more happening to you that you don’t want.”

Still, Peter is silent, mouth half-open, as if waiting for Tony to say something that will allow him to speak.

Tony bites the bullet. “I mean, I get it. If you don’t want to stick around here, that’s alright. But you could – what I mean to say is, this is all your choice. I want you to… to be happy.”

Something almost imperceptible fractures in Peter’s eyes – a longing that, before his eyes, passes into _confusion._

“Is it alright? I-If I stay here?” he asks softly.

Tony starts.

 _You really wanna stay here?_ The words are on the tip of his tongue, but in a bid to avoid misperception he changes approach as they reach his mouth. “Yeah. If you’re sure.”

“I know you didn’t ask for this, Mister Stark,” Peter blurts, running his words together in a declaration that catches Tony off guard. “So… I’m sorry.”

“Woah, woah, _woah._ Let’s back up. That’s not true.” Tony can feel his walls crumbling already at his admission, but he shoots them a quick mental _fuck you_ at the sight of the kid’s face pale with worry, _guilt_. “No, I didn’t ask for this. I’d never wish for – you know – for this to have happened –“ breaking off with teeth gritted in frustration, Tony lets his hands drop to the table, palms down, and forces his eyes upwards to rest somewhere around Peter’s chin. “You know what, _I’m_ sorry.”

“What do – why are _you_ sorry?”

“That you’re in this situation. You deserve another option.” Tonight is a time of brutal honesty, it seems, and maybe getting everything up in the air is better than continuing to skirt around it. “I know you’re uncomfortable with me. But… desperate times, desperate measures, I guess. So, I’ll try. I’ll _try_ to make it okay for you here if that’s alright with you.”

Peter tugs a hand through his unruly hair, eyebrows drawn together, and finally meets Tony’s gaze. “Mister Stark, I think we’re both on the wrong page. Like, at least six pages away from each other. I don’t think you’ve even read my… page.”

Humouring the clumsy metaphor, Tony levels with the cryptic kid. “You wanna read it for me?”

“Yeah. I’m not – I’m actually…” he pauses to swipe his lips with his tongue. “I probably seem nervous here because I wanna _stay_ here. I just… I guess I’m scared of messing up? I really don’t – don’t want you to…”

_Leave me._

The word _blindsided_ pales in comparison to what Tony’s feeling. _That’s not – I can’t believe I… Oh my God._

It’s a struggle to hang on to his veneer of snarky calm. “Right. Well, I’m gonna take the liberty of telling you that you’re way off base.”

“Speak for yourself, Mister Stark.” It’s murmured with a tinge of the sass he’s found himself longing to hear in the kid’s voice; Tony never thought he’d be so happy to have the kid quipping at his expense.

_Some guardian I am. He thought I was gonna – what – palm him off to CPS?_

Something breaks in Tony, who laughs humourlessly with a hand over his face. “God, we’re a mess, aren’t we, kiddo?”

“Yeah. Yeah, we are,” Peter replies with more sincerity than Tony had anticipated. As if to amend, he tacks on: “At least we’re matching, though, right?”

“You’re _killing_ me.”

And – yup, mentioning death was definitely an insensitive choice, Tony realises dumbly as Peter retreats right back into the same subdued silence he’s been wearing like a funeral suit to a party – _no more death references, oh my God -_ and he’s at a loss once more.

As if some omnipotent force has finally decided to show up and help him out, he’s presented with words, rushing at him like the sea and yet as clear as a still pond. _Apologize. Hug him. Tell him it’ll be okay. Help him feel like less of a_ _burden in his own house._

Tony won’t lie that his stomach doesn’t lurch at the notion of Peter _living_ here. It’s, in a way, perfectly terrifying, but in another… good?

Evidently, his brain has decided to work at a tenth of its regular pace this evening. He grasps at thought-words that can’t quite encompass the bittersweet cocktail of emotions running through him, and eventually gives up the practice altogether in favour of following those heavenly directions.

And, in true Tony Stark fashion, he royally fucks it up.

He picks up his half-finished bowl of pasta, angling towards the kitchen counter, and makes as if to take Peter’s too, successfully predicting the kid’s outburst of “Oh, don’t worry, I can take it.”

From here, the trouble starts: propelled prematurely by the clear voice, Tony blurts: “I’m sorry for saying that,” then abruptly moves in to hug Peter. Thankfully, Peter has the presence of mind to swerve his bowl out of the way before it’s crushed in between them, but seems so intent on minimising crockery-related collateral damage that the embrace takes him entirely by surprise: with a stiffening of limbs, he bumps against Tony, who’s rapidly realising that he’s being _dumb_ and _weird_ , in a collision of limbs that’s much closer to their mishaps in the kitchen earlier than the comforting hug Tony had envisioned.

And yet, an instinct that can’t be from his gut, which is screaming _abort abort abort_ at him, stills his hands, one gently cradling the small of Peter’s back and the other still wielding his own pasta bowl far away from them both.

Peter can’t yet bring himself to relax in the hold he knows he should appreciate, scarce as it is. But, for a second, he catches himself leaning into Tony, simply letting the man take his weight for a second. Tremulously, he lifts his free arm – the other being occupied with a hovering pasta bowl – and curls it upwards and over Tony’s shoulder.

_This is… nice._

The sigh that frees itself from his chest has to be involuntary because he barely notices it. It’s letting go, letting someone else hold him up for a while, letting his longing for comfort be assuaged.

“Wasn’t expecting this,” he murmurs a little sheepishly.

Tony hums in question.

“I thought we weren’t there yet.”

Recalling the awkward moment in the car all those months back – his front of flippancy as he explained away the sudden urge to lean into the kid, to soak up some of that infectious enthusiasm – and feels _shame_ run hot down his spine.

“Well, times have changed, bud.” He tries to encompass more in the light-hearted cover of a quip: _I’ve changed too. Hopefully, I’ve changed enough to be alright at looking after you, because God knows what I’d do with myself if you weren’t looked after right, especially if it was me making the mistakes._

The kid sees an alternative meaning that Tony hasn’t even considered. “Yeah, they- they really have,” he whispers, throat tight.

Tony tenses. _Tactlesss bastard. Get away from him before you do him more harm._

His heart rebels, but at the behest of his brain, his body does just that.

It’s not lost on him, however, that the poorly-hidden dismay in Peter’s eyes coalesces only as Tony pulls away.

There’s an apology crowding into Tony’s throat, but he finds a hand over his mouth and doesn’t even have to think to know that it’s Howard’s. The man never let the grave terminate his influence; Tony can only hope he’ll have the same influence with a marginally better impact. Before he can even think about that, there are a couple more barriers he’s going to have to break down.

Something tells him this kid is more than capable of doing that in his sleep.

Right now, though, his emotional sensitivity must be all dried up, because he turns away from the kid, who stands as if stranded in the centre of the room, and _finally_ stashes his dish where something useful might happen to it.

“Up for a movie now?” he asks as Peter follows his lead and stacks his crockery in the dishwasher, taking noticeable and painstaking care not to cross Tony’s path this time.

Although it’s abrupt, the kid seems to warm to the idea. “Um… okay. Sure.”

And if he ends up positioning himself close enough to the kid as they watch Stranger Things that they just _slightly_ brush together – well, that’s just a happy coincidence.

_What a birthday._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kaleb and I both love seeing people respond to our writing, so please go ahead and leave a comment!! It makes our day :)


	3. Child I'll Sing Till It's Clear

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “By the way, did you see the pear I put in your pocket this morning? Not an apple. Figured you’d noticed I’m switching up the routine.” Tony pauses for dramatic effect. “You know, ’cause I live life on the edge like that.”
> 
> There’s a second too long of silence for the interaction to be normal anymore at this point. By the time Peter speaks up, Tony’s on alert, though he keeps his eyes trained on the hologram in front of him.
> 
> “Yeah, I saw.”
> 
> Tony rubs his goatee. “...Was it good?”
> 
> “Y-yeah. Yeah. It was really good, thanks.”
> 
> Peter’s obviously lying. Tony would bet a couple of AI’s that that pear is still sitting somewhere smooshed underneath all the crap in the kid’s backpack, untouched.
> 
> And so Tony closes the hologram with a hand, sucks in a deep breath, and breaks rule number one of his lab day policy. He pries.
> 
> “Pete? Could you look at me for a second?”  
> \--  
> Tony thought Pete was doing better--or at least hanging in there. But when the kid has a panic attack in the lab and his newly developed eating disorder comes to light, Tony has to seriously rethink the physical distance that he's been putting between them because of his guilt and inadequacy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm putting trigger warnings right here for this chapter for anxiety, panic attacks, and somewhat detailed conversations about an eating disorder. Peter also says some unhealthy and harsh things about himself that are bad for hims mental health.
> 
> Stay safe, my babies, and if you decide to read, I hope you enjoy. :)
> 
> Theme song for this chapter: ["Homeward" by Future of Forestry](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HLit-C4Gl8g) (I been cried at this)

Times certainly have changed, in ways that could ache for centuries, but by the grace of God some things between Tony and Peter have stayed the same. Namely, lab day.

Ever since after-school lab days on Wednesdays transitioned from _flimsy cover for the Stark internship story_ to _look who’s suppressing his terrifying paternal instincts under the guise of mentorship_ , Peter has gone up to the Tower every week almost without fail to spend hours alongside Tony losing himself in the easy and mindless motions of building and designing.

After the accident and the hospital and the--and the goddamn funeral, after Peter somehow slipped from the humdrum of Queens into the quiet buzz of the Tower and found himself breathing his pain in and out between walls of luxury that are at once familiar and foreign to him, by some tacit agreement Tony still finds himself waiting in the lab every Wednesday afternoon for the kid to pad downstairs in his sweatpants and meld into the space beside him.

Tony may be emotionally constipated, but he is by no means an idiot. He knows that lab days have morphed into some kind of lifeline. Whether it is more of a lifeline for Peter or for Tony no longer matters. It never did; nor was it a question that either of them dared to surface--for what good is there in taking a hammer to the only semblance of normalcy, the only illusion that works in turning back time?

So if Tony notices from the corner of his eye that Peter has been staring motionless at the same motherboard in his hands for the last ten minutes, he doesn’t mention it. That is another term in their unspoken contract: the kid gets to lose himself in his thoughts down here without Tony awkwardly taking on the role of grief counselor and trying to pick his brain for those depressing self-destructive patterns he knows are swimming around in there.

Tony sets down his hex key after another loaded moment and sniffs. “You hungry, kid?”

There’s an awkward stretch of silence, with the only indication that Peter heard him being the slight shift in weight between his shoulders. Then a rustle of his hoodie as the boy presumably shakes his head. “Not really.”

“Okay, so I’d like to think I’m getting better at the whole brooding teenager dialect thing, but you’re gonna have to help me out here. Are you saying _not really_ as in ‘not really, but I could eat,’ or ‘I don’t really care because it’s not cool to feel passionate about things,’ or just plain ‘I’m starving my brains out but I’m playing it off because I don’t want Mr. Stark to hold it over my head that he always reminds me when to eat like the saintly guardian that he is’?”

In response, Peter shuffles the motherboard across his table with an uneven clatter and tosses some sundry oil-stained rags after it, and leans backwards over the back of his rolling chair so he’s making eye contact upside-down with Tony from across the room. “That’s hilarious coming from the guy who needs an AI to tell him when to drink one of his weird green smoothie thingies and then doesn’t even obey her.”

“Watch it.” Tony cocks a brow and points in the boy’s direction. “They’re called kale shakes, and you better show some respect to my rigid diet. These glutes didn’t just happen by a miracle--”

“--Aargh!” Peter screws his eyes shut and claps his palms over his ears. “It’s a miracle my soul is still _pure_ after living around you for the past couple weeks!”

“Is it, though? Is it really?” Tony saunters over to him and raps the kid on the nose with a knuckle. “C’mon, up and at ’em, young buck. Are we doing pepperoni or jalapeño or sausage tonight?”

The kid rights himself with a yawn and a stretch, almost upending his rolling chair in the process. He hops down with a clumsiness that belies the spider-like agility that Tony knows he possesses, and taps a few things on the nearest keyboard to pull up a projection of the pizza menu. “What I’m doing is calling Ms. Potts to tell on your pizza addiction,” he threatens Tony casually.

Tony lowers his StarkPad to lift an unimpressed brow at Peter. “It’s six in the morning in Beijing, Pete. Though personally I’m not gonna stop you from arranging your own funeral if that’s what you want.”

Tony knows he’s an idiot, but geez, his brain-to-mouth filter could at least have the decency to activate itself once in a while when it comes to joking about death.

For a full one and a half seconds Peter makes no indication that he’s registered the insensitive jest--and then it all seems to come crashing down on him at once. It’s remarkable, really, how not a hair on his person shifts, save the subtle clench in the fingers of his left hand still hovering over the keyboard and the sudden slackness of his mouth. 

Another second later, delayed like a badly edited laugh track on a sitcom, Peter lets out a huff and then a hysterical giggle.

Tony’s brow knits in consternation. He holds up a hand, not daring to join Peter in his laughter just yet. “I’m sorry. God, Pete, I’m an idiot, oh my--wow. I’m sorry. Gosh.”

“Don’t even worry about it.”

“I’m serious. I mean it. I screwed up and there’s no reason on earth why I should have said--”

“Really, Mr. Stark.” Peter swipes the cuff of his hoodie sleeve over his brow too swiftly for it to pass for mopping the sweat off his skin, but Tony doesn’t even have the heart to point out the redness around the kid’s eyes. 

The boy is still talking. “I needed a laugh like that. God. You know how like they’re always so sensitive talking about death and stuff in the movies? Like right after someone dies? Oh my God.” Peter gasps out a breath, and Tony’s own heartbeat stutters in his chest because he doesn’t know anymore whether to anticipate another fit of giggles or a panic attack on his hands. “Oh my _God_. Like that’s not how it works, you know?” Another hitch, another gasp.

“...Pete?”

“I’m good, I’m good.” It’s Peter’s turn to hold up a hand in his mentor’s direction. “I promise. I was just thinking about this time when May got stuck in the emergency room because she was looking for Trent who was Ruth’s boyfriend at the time and Ruth is her friend, you know? They’re neonatal buddies. Anyway. Off-topic. Trent works in the ER and May was looking for him to get him to get a message to Ruth because--uh, well, so there was this mom who was in there and she was crying something awful because her son had been in a motorcycle accident, I think, and the doctors didn’t know if he was gonna make it or not because crushed lungs are, like, messed up business and this mom thought May was an ER nurse so she grabbed May’s arm and started shaking her and demanding answers and all that and...and… May said she was feeling incredibly stupid that day but that encounter, like, really topped the list of stupid incidents in her book. She told the woman to get off her or she’d chop off her arm and give her a real reason to stay in the ER.”

Tony unclenches his fists at his sides, where he hasn’t realized till now that they have been curled into white-knuckled balls of anticipation. He releases a breath in tandem with his heartbeat evening out. He even manages a soft chuckle. “If I hadn’t met May before, I would’ve rolled my eyes and said you were exaggerating.”

“Right?” Peter’s shaking, half from silent laughter and half from that other emotion they both refuse to pin a name to. “The woman took one look at May and then they both doubled over laughing like a bunch of, like a bunch of grannies at a pie fair or something.”

“Hey!” says Tony, with no real bite to it. “Me and Rhodey happen to love pie contests.”

“May I repeat: _grannies_.”

Tony seizes his chance when he sees it and whacks the side of Peter’s arm with a rag. “Infant.”

“Stop projecting.” Peter dabs again at his eyes with the cuffs of his hoodie, swiftly, a bit suspiciously, and he collapses back onto the nearest stool as if he has just folded in on himself.

For once in his life, Tony doesn’t say or do anything, but simply swings a step closer to the boy and hoists himself onto the table to watch the top of Peter’s head. He nudges the keyboard over a couple of inches so he can lean back on an elbow and casually look up at the ceiling while stealing glances at the kid from the corner of his eye.

Silence beats like a heart between them. Tony finds himself grateful for the fact that the quiet is at least punctuated by the little puffs of breath from the kid. Nothing will ever frighten him in quite the same bottomless and inexplicable way that Peter did that night he was silent as a stone at the kitchen table and tears streamed from his eyes over the bridge of his nose as if he almost didn’t know he was supposed to be grieving.

“So.” Tony’s eyes are closed for the moment, his voice gravelly. “Pepperoni or sausage?”

Peter’s chuckle sounds a little wet, but neither of them mention it. “You think I’d just forget about the jalapeño option?”

“Suit yourself. You’re ordering, then.”

“What’s FRIDAY still hanging around for, then?”

“Geez, Gen Z-ers and their addiction to technology,” Tony drolls with as much sarcasm as he can muster. He rolls his gaze to the side to meet Peter’s and flicks at the hood which the boy must have pulled up over his hair in the last few minutes. Still maintaining eye contact with Pete, his own mouthing twitching a bit, Tony raises his voice at the ceiling. “You got that, FRI?”

“Two jalapeño pizzas, one pepperoni and one sausage, Boss? I take it it’ll be the usual.”

“Good girl.”

FRIDAY makes some kind of hum or noise to the affirmative. 

Peter has dropped his gaze back to the table and is tracing the patterns of gouges and pen grooves in it with his thumbnail. “You know, that was back in 2015.”

“Come again?”

“The whole arm-chopping and laughing in the ER thing. Ben had just died. May always told me she and the woman probably had that kind of, I dunno, grieving connection.”

Tony wets his lips. Aims for casualness. “D’you know if her son got through the surgery okay?”

Peter hits an extra deep groove in the tabletop and there’s the small, surprised sound of a tiny piece of his nail chipping. “Yeah. Yeah, he did.”

Tony starts to lean back. Peter shoves the keyboard away far enough to let the man drape himself comfortably across the table with his hands laced behind his head.

“You’re right, kiddo,” Tony says softly behind closed lids. “Everybody could use a laugh. Even after…”

How ironic it is that he is the one who can’t even say the goddamn word.

“Yeah,” says Peter, just as quietly. “Especially after.”

\--

While Tony may have some unspoken policy of not calling out Peter on his weird behavior on lab day--and truth be told, everyone only has to meet Peter once to know his baseline is weird (in that adorable and endearing way)--he can’t help but notice something off-kilter going on with the kid’s relationship with food.

Granted, Tony assumes that Peter hasn’t always had enough to eat for his supermutant metabolism, having grown up in a modest household, and he knows from personal experience that grief can drive you catatonic, but the wild upticks and plummets in Peter’s appetite lately have him concerned. Tony has taken to packing extra granola bars and apples or bananas in the pockets of Pete’s backpack (he’ll deny that it’s for anything other than the laughs), and on most days the backpack will come back emptied of the surprise snacks. But other days, he will catch a glimpse of two or three bananas down there at the bottom of the kid’s bag, slowly going speckled under a sheaf of papers.

Some nights, Peter will wolf down plates of pasta and even a bowl of salad or greens like it’s his last meal on earth. Other nights, he’ll be practicing his patented evasion techniques, pushing the food around with his fork with enough enthusiasm to feign eating. On the really bad nights, Tony has learned, Peter will convince him to eat with him in front of the TV and barely touch his meal as both of them become absorbed in the show on screen. One moment his bowl will be full next to him, and then the next the food has disappeared somewhere else that Tony can’t fathom. Those are usually the nights that Pepper is not around to monitor their schedules, the man admits to himself.

Tony debates seriously with himself whether to broach the topic with the kid. Sure, Rhodey was a bit more upfront about the feelings part of Tony’s grieving process, but Tony also wants to prove to Peter that he can keep his distance and treat the teen like an adult with privacy. 

“I mean, it’s not like he’s really getting that skinny, right, DUM-E?” Tony says rhetorically one morning.

The bot whirrs in what could be interpreted as a vaguely disapprovingly tone, but Tony chooses to ignore his instincts and pat his companion on the head instead.

Still, Tony can’t help himself one Wednesday when Peter comes plodding down the stairs and the man catches sight of the oily cardboard box in his hand before the kid has even slipped through the glass door.

“Whatchu got there, Pete? Pizza?”

Peter deigns him with a grunt. He heaves his battered backpack onto the usual table and rifles through the papers inside for a moment.

Tony tries for a joke. “Thought you’d sworn it off last week. Y’know, after you ate two and a half pies all by yourself and got gas pains so bad you said you’d rather get dunked in a lake again than touch another pizza?”

“That was last week,” Peter mumbles. It sounds like he’s thrown in an eyeroll or two for good measure.

“By the way, did you see the pear I put in your pocket this morning? Not an apple. Figured you’d noticed I’m switching up the routine.” Tony pauses for dramatic effect. “You know, ’cause I live life on the edge like that.”

There’s a second too long of silence for the interaction to be normal anymore at this point. By the time Peter speaks up, Tony’s on alert, though he keeps his eyes trained on the hologram in front of him.

“Yeah, I saw.”

Tony rubs his goatee. “...Was it good?”

“Y-yeah. Yeah. It was really good, thanks.”

Peter’s obviously lying. Tony would bet a couple of AI’s that that pear is still sitting somewhere smooshed underneath all the crap in the kid’s backpack, untouched.

And so Tony closes the hologram with a hand, sucks in a deep breath, and breaks rule number one of his lab day policy. He pries.

“Pete? Could you look at me for a second?”

The kid scratches his head and obeys.

“What are you not telling me?”

And that, that right there, triggers the most alarming reaction Tony has ever seen from the boy. Peter slams the cardboard box down onto the table with far more strength than necessary and turns to snap at him, “Nothing.”

“Whoa. Okay, bud, I didn’t mean to make you go all Hulk on me.” Tony takes a few more steps closer to Pete and folds his arms loosely over his chest. “I don’t care if you’re having pizza, to be honest. Just as long as you’re having some greens every now and again and you’re not letting all the fruit rot inside your bag.”

Peter narrows his eyes up at the man at that, and it takes several seconds before Tony suddenly realizes that the kid is shaking, minute tremors running from his chin to his shoulders and the ends of his hands.

“If you don’t care, then let me be. It’s one pizza. Bugger off.”

Coming from Peter, that feels like a punch to the chest. “Listen, Pete, I will in a sec, but I’ve been meaning to talk to you about--”

“Hi, how are you, Peter? How was your day at school?” Peter runs over him with far more sarcasm dripping from his voice than Tony would have ever thought possible. “Did you get your calc test back from last week?”

Something about that makes Tony’s hackles rise. “Stop deflecting. I know what you’re doing.”

“No, you don’t. You don’t have a _fucking_ clue.”

“Watch your mouth, Peter. And you know what? I do. I actually _do_ know what you’re doing because I’ve been doing it my whole life. So cut the crap and talk to me. This isn’t about the pizza, is it? There’s something going on. I know it’s hard, kid, I _know_. But it’s just the two of us, it’s just you and me here. You know you can tell me. _Talk to me_.”

Peter’s eyes are blown wide and the color seems to have fled from his lips. The trembling has taken hostage of his entire body, and he’s shaking like he’s not even aware of it, like he’s never known how to walk or stand steady on his two feet and he might keel over at any second without knowing.

Tony in turn finds himself blanching. He barely gets out a cry of “Pete!” before his throat closes up and the next thing he knows, Peter is stumbling in his direction and tripping over something with one hand out for him and then falling to the floor in a tangle of laces and heavy breathing. Something goes spinning in the air and crashes on the far end of the room.

 _Thud_.

Peter crumples to the concrete like a melting sack of bones. His heart a ball of cotton in his mouth, Tony drops to his knees and crawls over to the kid.

“Pete. Pete?”

He waves a hand in front of Peter. The boy chokes and gives out a sickening wheeze, like his lungs have turned to sponge. For one horrifying fraction of a second Tony is drenched in images of the mother in the ER with her mouth open in a scream, not knowing if the doctors will ever be able to breathe life back into the lungs of her son.

“Pete! _Pete!_ Look at me. Look at me. That’s it, I’m right here. What’s going on? Panic attack? Is that--? Is that it? Okay. Okay, it’s okay, everything’s fine, bud. Okay. Okay.”

Valiantly, Peter scrabbles for purchase on the concrete floor and sucks in a breath that sounds like it hurts like knives. His chest is moving, but it’s fast, way too fast. The rapid tremors under his skin are beginning to claim him.

“ _Shit!_ Sorry, Pete, I’m so sorry, I didn’t fucking know I was gonna trigger you, oh my God. Just focus on breathing, right? Okay, let’s do this. I’m gonna--fuck--I’m gonna have to…” 

Tony swallows. He needs to touch Peter to prop him up into a half-decent position so he can at least begin to breathe more slowly. Internally he curses the compulsion that screams at him to turn around, run away, that tells him he should not be touching the boy.

That he has no right.

But the other part of him, the one that has always been louder even if he never speaks of it, urges him to shut his eyes and just do it--because Peter needs it. Peter needs _him_.

“Sorry,” Tony mutters with a wince, and reaches forward and grabs the kid none too gently by the sides of his face. And then the next thing he knows, his hands have slipped around to interlock behind the back of Peter’s neck, and he’s hauling the gasping kid up to his knees and pulling him closer against his chest until Pete’s cheek is resting flush against the warm fabric of Tony’s t-shirt. One of Peter’s hands comes up haphazardly in the air to grasp at--at _something_ , and from an instinct Tony does not question, he reaches out to grab Peter’s hand in his own and lace their fingers together.

Several seconds pass before Tony notices that Peter’s mouth is moving and he is speaking a barely discernible string of words.

“Sorry, sorry, I’m...I’m sorry…”

“Shh, shh shh.” Tony brings their interlocked hands to his lap between their bodies and courses his free hand through the tangles in Peter’s hair. There’s moisture dripping down the front of his shirt somewhere, and more than likely the sharp thing poking him in the chest is Peter’s nose, but he doesn’t care. He strokes the back of Peter’s head, all the way from the roots of his wavy locks to the sensitive spot at his nape. Tony repeats the motion over and over, losing count, just listening for the whine of Peter’s breathing to slow and even out to match every second beat of his own heart.

“That’s it. You got it. Use those super-ears and listen to my heart go, yeah?”

Peter’s loud sniffle interrupts the air like a crackle. He shifts as if he wants to free his hand from Tony’s so he can wipe his nose, but something possesses Tony and he doesn’t let go. Instead he buries his other hand in Peter’s hair and gently urges the kid to turn his face back into his chest. 

So what if his shirt gets ruined forever. Tony would give it up and a thousand more, if only to make up for the moments when he was not there to catch Peter before he fell and wipe away the tears that no one saw.

A low, tentative hiccup tells Tony that Peter’s breathing has finally coasted back to normal and he is in the exhausted phase of his post-panic attack routine. Tony pats the back of his head for good measure.

“Better?” Tony asks. He doesn’t move his arms just yet, as a silent kind of promise to the kid that he doesn’t have to lose any comfort by admitting that the worst of the storm has passed.

“Yeah,” Peter rasps out. “Much. Thanks.”

Tony swallows again. “I’d say don’t mention it, but...y’know…”

The boy breaks out into a wobbly smile, all teeth and snot and awkward cheek-scrubbing in his position against Tony’s chest. “But we kinda have to talk about it. Yeah.”

Tony flashes him what he hopes is a sympathetic grimace. “Sorry.”

“S’okay.”

“Well, a couple more minutes won’t hurt,” Tony concedes. He almost bends down to drop a kiss on the top of Peter’s head just as the kid’s eyes shut for a moment. But he doesn’t.

A few moments later, Peter slowly rearranges himself so he is no longer kneeling on the concrete and is instead lying more or less in a more relaxed pose with his legs over Tony’s knee. He nuzzles the soft and now somewhat moist cotton of Tony’s shirt and then finally looks up.

“She used to say that.”

“The food?”

Peter flinches. “No. The--the _just you and me_ thing. That night I got home after the…” He licks his lips. “--After the ferry. She was worried out of her mind. She told me to cut the bullshit and just…”

Tony clenches his jaw. Christ.

“...To just lay it on her, because it was just her and me now.”

And what can Tony say to that that could remotely begin to ease the fathomless pain? I’m sorry? I didn’t know? I shouldn’t have--?

“I think about that day a lot,” Peter whispers. He wraps his arms around himself and bobs his right foot up and down in the air, just for something to do, a futile attempt at nonchalance when they both know it’s a fucking farce. Tony feels the pressure of the movement on his knee, up, down, up, down, up, down.

“It replays in my head sometimes like a movie script. I gotta, gotta admit I don’t remember half the stuff May said to me and it drives me crazy because it’s, it would be, it’s stupid, right? But that was the first time she ever showed me something other than her trying to be the stable adult in my life. Before then--Ben--Skip--you know? It was always her making sure I didn’t see too much just how much it hurt. You know? But she couldn’t do that anymore, I understood it then, I understand it so much better now, oh my God--because--because--” The tiny little gasps of breath have caught up with Peter. Tony rubs circles into his hair and waits for him to continue. “--’Cause it was literally just her and me. And she thought at that point that was it. I was gone. I was gone. It would be just her from then on, all alone, nobody there with her. No more _me and you_. And now--”

Peter chokes, an echo of the ball of pain lodged inside Tony’s throat.

His grip tightens infinitesimally on the child in his arms.

“And now it’s all _me_ and no _her_ and--geez, that doesn’t even make sense.” That jerks a crazed laugh from Peter at himself. “I feel sick when I need to eat. I stare at the plate and I start thinking of all the times I made fun of her cooking and like--I don’t mean that I don’t appreciate what you feed me but--this is all coming out wrong but you know what I mean. Don’t you, Mr. Stark? Like. I’ll go so long eating as little as possible and then it’s like something wakes up inside me and I have to devour everything in sight and I, I found out what makes me feel best about myself when that happens, and it’s usually bad food, it’s terrible. I buy food at the gas station and the bodega on my way to and from school and I--”

For the first time in what feels like eternity, Peter sucks in a deep breath before continuing.

“I hide in bathrooms and under the bleachers to eat everything.”

Tony’s eyes are misty. He doesn’t dare release his grip on Peter to wipe them, not now.

“It’s fucked up, Mr. Stark.”

“No,” Tony cuts him off in a fierce whisper. “It’s not. Believe me, bud, it’s not.”

“It makes me feel so guilty, and I start imagining what--what _she_ would say if she knew what I was doing. But I can’t stop, Tony, I can’t--I _can’t_ \--once it starts I know I could’ve seen it coming from a mile off but I can’t fucking _stop_ \--”

“I know. I know, kid. I know.”

Peter’s chin trembles. “You do?”

Tony steels himself before speaking. “Grief does shit to your brain. It’s all normal, just manifests itself in different ways. Addiction. The five stages. Weird hyperfixations. A lot of stuff that’s cyclical, and that’s why it feels like you can’t escape it.”

A fresh tear cuts a track across the bridge of Peter’s nose. His eyes are shining with a brand of shame so familiar to Tony that he could splinter into a million glass pieces at any moment now.

“I’m sorry,” Peter says. He hardly sounds like he knows whether he ought to mean it.

“Hey. _Hey_. Don’t you dare apologize. This isn’t on you, okay? Got it? _I’m_ sorry for triggering you, no matter how oblivious I might’ve been. I just, uh, I’ve been noticing lately all the…”

“Weird shit going on with me and food?” Peter supplies.

Tony does manage to crack a wry smile at that. “We are instituting a swear jar after this heart-to-heart, I swear, but for now the rules are suspended.”

Peter’s mouth quirks upward just the tiniest bit.

“Listen. We gotta communicate with each other, right? That’s what--that’s what made May worry about you more than half the time. Especially with the whole super-spandex gig you had going on. I’m gonna try to be better at this, and you gotta do your part too, yeah? I’m not gonna say insensitive shit about food, and I’m gonna genuinely ask you if you’re hungry and how you’re feeling about your meals and stuff.”

Peter leans upward and scrubs the side of his face with his sleeve. “That could work.”

“You think so?”

Peter’s half-smile widens at the childlike hope in Tony’s voice. “Yeah. And, I mean, I’m gonna try really, really hard to call you or text you when I get...those…”

“Urges?”

“Yeah.”

“D’you think--um. I hate to be presumptuous.”

Peter rolls him a look that has Tony internally rejoicing at the return of the Eternally Unimpressed Teenager. “Oh, wow, you had me fooled there for a second.”

“Hardy har har.” Tony gives his arm a light punch. “Seriously, though. If you ever feel like you need to talk to somebody about this...somebody who might be, er, easier, as in _not_ me…”

Peter tips to the side to rest his head against Tony’s shoulder a moment. The man feels the rasp of Peter’s nod against his shirt. “I don’t think I want to do that just yet.”

“Okay. But you’ll tell me, right?”

“Y-yeah. Yeah, I will.”

“So we have a deal?”

Peter presses his nose into Tony’s shoulder. “Deal.”

“Okay. Cool.” Tony clears his throat. “Great. That’s super.” Behind Peter’s back, he plays with a stray thread hanging from the hem of the kid’s sweatshirt. “You called me Tony, by the way.”

The kid stills against him. A pause of feigned innocence. “...Did I?”

Tony shrugs and chuckles to himself when Peter protests softly at his face getting jostled. “Yeah, I may be a...what was it again? A _granny_ , but I’m pretty sure I heard you right the first time. In fact! We’ve got evidence, right? FRI?”

“That won’t be necessary,” Peter stammers, pulling away from Tony’s shoulder in haste. The man briefly mourns the loss of contact before violently suppressing the pesky paternal instinct. “I think we can both agree I was a little out of it? Right?”

Tony takes pity on the pleading in the boy’s eyes and shakes his head in fond resignation. “You know, I wouldn’t mind if you actually called me Tony. Not one bit.”

“Yeah, well…” Peter’s teeth sink into his bottom lip. “I don’t think I’m...ready yet.”

Inexplicably, Tony’s heart thumps in understanding. He shouldn’t be able to catch the boy’s drift from a single enigmatic statement, and yet here he is, reading Peter’s shifts of tone and eye contact as if he’s known him all his life.

All the ones Peter has ever loved: mother, father, uncle, aunt...all have been close enough for him to call them by their nicknames or their first names.

And God above knows Tony would be the last one to force Peter into anything that causes him pain and anxiety. Not after literally everything the universe has thrown at him, after Peter has picked himself up off the ground year after year and managed to tape his smile back together just like the missing pieces of his heart.

“That’s understandable,” Tony murmurs after a drawn-out moment.

“Thanks, Mr. Stark.”

“Not sure what for, but I am an ever-radiant presence that deserves gratitude anyway, so you’re welcome.”

Peter rolls his eyes. “Dork.”

“Nerd.”

“Ass.”

“Aaaand we’re instituting the swear jar now.”

The two of them dissolve into giggles that rack their sore, tired bodies with a fleeting touch of happiness that hurts. And as Peter thumps his head back against Tony’s thigh and lets the man play tentatively with his curls, he mumbles, “Mr. Stark?”

“Yeah-huh?”

“D’you think there’s any chance I could go patrolling again? I know it feels really soon and you’ll probably worry about my state of mind and everything but honestly, it might--”

“Yeah. Sure.”

“Wait--really?”

“Yeah, why not?” Tony scratches the side of his face. “I think you need to get back into some more routine. It might even help with the appetite and everything.”

For once, Peter’s half-smile shows some teeth. “Yeah. It just might. Thanks.”

“...Did you seriously forget what just happened the last time you thanked me?”

“Meh.” Peter shrugs. “You’re the one making yourself a laughingstock, not me. And besides, everybody needs a good laugh now and then.”

The space of a breath hangs between them.

“Especially after?”

“Especially after.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I gotta admit, my writing is almost always heavily influenced by personal experience, but this particular chapter was really reflective of my past couple months of struggling with a bulimia relapse. If you got through the chapter and maybe found some kind of cathartic release from it, I'm glad. Stay safe, stay strong, stay happy. There's always a light at the end of the tunnel. <3 -kaleb


	4. I Will Carry You Always

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Augh… Mis’r Stark?”  
> Words. Those are good. And he recognizes me.  
> “How’s your head feel?”  
> “’Been worse.” Peter’s wavering tone is not at all convincing. Tony wished he could see past the mask and gauge better from the kid’s utterly transparent face.  
> For a split second, he loses his cool.  
> “What did Mendeleev’s periodic table predict?” he blurts.  
> “The atomic mass… ‘f elements that were undiscovered at the time,” Peter murmurs, white mechanical eye sockets squinting slightly as he gazes up at Tony. “C’mon, Mister Stark, I could… I could answer that in my sleep.”  
> \--  
> Tony, rushing in to help Peter out after a patrol goes wrong, witnesses first-hand the deeply-rooted, terrifying martyr complex of his kid and discovers the extent of Howard's hold on him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (dude writing that lil synospis in the chapter summary was so hard??? how do you do it kaleb)  
> Hey y'all, it's Daisy again! I'm back from the depths of a gross cold and ready to share this next act of the story with you guys!!  
> So... oddly enough, the first chapter I wrote was this one. I had a really strong vision for it so kinda jumped the gun and it's ended up just a teeny bit... bitty? But for all you lads who enjoy a action-based chapter, this one's for you!  
> Theme song for this chapter: ["Carry You" by Novo Amor](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FdzKagaiebo)  
> Trigger warning: injury detail - nothing really gory and gross but our baby gets knocked around a bit :(

_“Boss, I’ve received an alert from Karen. Peter’s been injured while on patrol. Should I activate the Find a Toddler Protocol?”_

Tony can't help but admit that the Tower feels empty this afternoon – lonely, even - without the presence of a certain ever-more-effervescent superkid.

Almost 3 months in, and Peter still has his bad days: days when Tony catches him skipping meals or wandering into a spiral of downwards thought; that time when they’d made the misguided choice of watching the Lion King and Peter had hastily exited the room at the pivotal point when Simba sees Mufasa’s body, stammering out an excuse of getting a drink but only re-emerging half an hour later with inflamed eyes.

They’re painful for Tony to witness, but totally understandable. And yet, miraculously, things seem to be looking up.

They have their routine. Peter leaves at 7 am on school mornings to catch his train. Tony positions himself on the couch closest to the elevator precisely 2 minutes before Peter returns from school in order to give the appearance of having been there for a while already, leaving him in a prime position to grill the kid on his day after he neatly stows his shoes, jacket and bag (a habit Tony has reminded him is unnecessary for weeks with DUM-E around but which he continues tirelessly to uphold). Peter dives onto the opposite couch and Tony allows him to ramble through the day’s events, a smirk of endearment growing on his face as he studies Peter’s animated expressions. They grab a snack together – Tony has found Peter is less self-conscious about his constant snacking when he has a companion – and then, most likely, Peter will pull on his suit and be off in the blink of an eye, mask pulled clear of his mouth to allow him to swallow a final mouthful before he leaps dizzyingly from the balcony with a call of, “See you, Mister Stark!”

Tony would never have expected to be plunged into such a strange iteration of domestic bliss at such short notice, but… it’s nice. Peter’s mere presence is a tether, a mediation which quells his self-destructive tendencies, and – Tony hopes – vice versa.

But of course, Peter’s time as Spider-Man sometimes adds to the bad days. They’re bad days for the both of them: signalling pain for Peter and worry for Tony.

Tony jolts upwards from where he’s been soldering a tear in the chestplate of a suit (he might have a veritable fleet of robots and mechanisms which could more efficiently repair the minor damage but it’s comforting to get his hands dirty) and replies urgently to FRIDAY. “Yep. Activate it. Call my suit. Call _him_.”

The soldering iron and suit section are discarded without a second thought. He’s slaved over this protocol to ensure it always follows through without a hitch; this is one area he isn’t willing to compromise on.

Right on time, FRIDAY produces a holographic display of Peter’s vitals. Just then, the call patches through.

 _“Mister Stark?”_ Peter sounds more bewildered than ailing.

“Who else?” Tony’s reply is curt as he scans the display, which pulses red around the kid’s upper ribs along with the smaller yellow hazes of cuts and bruises that seem a staple of patrolling for Peter. Bruising was – Tony refused to call it _okay_ – no cause for concern, as Peter had so often assured him, but he winces at the sight of the cracked ribs.

“ _What… why did you call me?”_

Peter’s acting is atrocious.

“Don’t play dumb, Karen gave me an alert. What’s going on down there?”

A faint sound of shattering glass and a muttered phrase Tony suspected was _“holy macaroni”_ preceded Peter’s reply. _“Some guy – Tombstone, I think he said? I mean –_ ouch _– maybe it was dumb of me to assume he’d be easy to take-_ woah! _– to-t-take down… but, like, come on, he stood around waving his guns and monologuing for so long I could’ve dozed off – so, uh, your classic – don’t you dare – classic vanilla bad guy, right? But – you can try, buddy, but that’s never gonna work!”_

In his exasperation, Tony has long surpassed the pinching-bridge-of-nose stage and moved on to scrubbing-face-repetitively-with-hand. The motion is intercepted, however, by the rapidly assembling limbs of Mark 42.

 _“And then – and then he just nodded his head and this army of skeleton guys literally dr- okay,_ you’ve _gotta chill –_ ow – _they, uh, they fell into the street and they’re_ not _happy – plus it’s raining buckets – Mister Stark, you should totally add little windscreen wipers to the eyes of this suit, that’d be—”_

Tony is already directing extra power into his thrusters in preparation to take off. “Okay, I’m coming to help you out,” he interjected through Peter’s tirade.

He swears he can _hear_ Peter’s eyes widening and hands fluttering at his sides as he rushes to make a paltry excuse. _“Oh, no, no, no – it’s fine, it’s all good, I got this—”_

“Don’t even try, kid. I’ve got a display of your vitals. I’m on my way.”

_“But I—”_

“No buts.” Tony’s not interested in hearing anything that would attempt to justify the kid carrying on alone and injured. _Is this what being a guardian is like? Constantly running after a kid who wants to do it all himself?_ “You’re hurt. I’ll try not to cramp your style, okay?”

The returning _“okay”_ from Peter sounds almost defeated. Tony, was he not encased in gold-titanium alloy, would pinch himself to quell the guilt that he shouldn’t be feeling at going to save the reckless kid.

_“I guess maybe I do need backu—"_

The sudden, harshly dull sound of a heavy blow issues through the call. Peter falls silent.

The display of his vitals, now visible in the corner of Tony’s suit display, pulse violently red around the back of his head.

“Kid?”

Tony will berate himself later for wasting precious time stilled in shock. He calls out fruitlessly, cutting between endearments and reprimands: “Pete? Can you hear me? If you’re playing another prank, so help me, I’ll… Hey, bud. Talk to me. Are you alright?”

More silence.

The ground has fallen from beneath him.

Tony pulls himself together. “Okay, kid, hang on in there. I’m coming. FRI, find the kid.”

_“On it.”_

He’s on the scene in minutes.

Peter’s “skeleton guys” are instantly recognizable, armed with clunky space-age tech they should _not_ have access to. Tombstone, grey-skinned and flashing a macabre grin, is causing havoc with his guns and goons further down the street, where he’s got a band of civilians encircled. As much as Tony longs to go straight to Peter, his duty is to the civilians currently at Tombstone’s mercy.

“How’s our precious cargo?” Tony ventures, ineffectually attempting to push the memory of said _cargo_ ’s over-enthusiastic voice cutting off out of his head.

_“Unconscious, but stable and out of immediate danger.”_

_That’ll have to do_.

Rain continues to pummel the bullet-riddled street into submission.

He approaches a stray skeleton guy, sizes him up. “Hey, Walking Dead.”

Here in the thick of battle where he can quip to his heart’s content, Tony is in his element.

“I think Pet Semetary was right: sometimes dead _is_ better!”

Iron Man has it handled. Tombstone scarpers before Tony can get at him, but the skeleton guys, although not easily blasted away, have a weakness for electric shocks; after downing the first wave, he herds the band of terrified civilians out of danger.

_Now it’s time to find you, kid._

Peter had hit the ground in a ridiculously convenient area that concealed him behind a dumpster. Tony’s jaw tightens at the sight of his crumpled limbs, huddled body too small against a grimy brick wall. Out cold. The suit looks soaked through, too.

Tony disengages his own suit, leaving it standing sentry beside them both, and kneels before the kid, who is chillingly vulnerable in his unconscious state. He reaches out – to wake him up, to check his ribs, his head –

And then – and _then_ –

His hand stills inches from Peter’s shoulder.

_Come. On._

And yet, there’s a deep-rooted surge of _inadequacy_ that cuts off his move.

Before he can _snap out of it_ and do something, Peter does the decision-making for him, rousing groggily. “Augh… Mis’r Stark?”

_Words. Those are good. And he recognizes me._

As the kid stirs, one hand flies immediately to his still-masked head, the other grasping blearily in Tony’s general direction and prompting Tony to make up his mind: he folds his fingers firmly over Peter’s palm and steadies him. “Yeah, it’s me. Hi, kiddo.” He keeps his voice down, aware that any head trauma might mess with the kid’s super senses. Peter groans low in his throat and, in a display of pure adolescent dumbassery, tries to sit up simultaneously.

“Woah – nuh uh. Not yet.” This time, Tony doesn’t hesitate before planting his free hand at the hinge between Peter’s shoulder and neck to lever him back down. “How’s your head feel?”

“’Been worse.” Peter’s wavering tone is not at all convincing. Tony wishes he could see past the mask and gauge better from the kid’s utterly transparent face.

For a split second, he loses his cool. Maybe the hit has knocked out his memory, struck a fatal blade through his brilliant young mind, and he’ll remain incoherent and in pain forever and on _Tony’s watch_ and if he’d just—

“What did Mendeleev’s periodic table predict?” he blurts.

“The atomic mass… ‘f elements that were undiscovered at the time,” Peter murmurs, white mechanical eye sockets squinting slightly as he gazes up at Tony. “C’mon, Mister Stark, I could… I could answer that in my sleep.”

Tony exhales, irritated by how shaky the breath sounds. “FRI?”

_“My scanners cannot penetrate through tissue. They can only detect contusions.”_

Great. Just great. Fear of the unknown, Tony’s favourite state.

“Okay, kid. Listen up.” Tony taps Peter’s shoulder; the eye lenses of the suit whir to fix on him. “I’m gonna go out and clear up the skeleton guys for you. Your job is to sit tight here and run that motormouth of yours so I have a constant update on how you’re doing. Got it?”

But Peter lurches to his feet at this. He shakes his head, although it only worsens his whirligig vision. “But I’m fine – ‘m fine – g-gotta take him down, I said I could h—”

Tony’s mind had been made up even before the kid leapt up and made an aborted attempt at staggering out of the alleyway.

“No – kid, come on…”

He catches Peter before he can hit the ground, his muscles aching in protest as he shoulders the partial deadweight. “Sorry,” Peter garbles, splaying his hands out against the wall behind him as Tony lowers him down again. As he hits the floor, his head rocks back into the wall; he emits a choked gasp which makes Tony’s heart skip a beat, but as if sensing his mentor’s concern, he breathes, “I’m okay. Sorry. ‘m okay.”

_Yeah, kid. Sure._

“I told you to stand down.” Tony doesn’t have the heart to get angry right now. Not with Peter hurt and dizzy and – still clinging on to him.

He persists, meeting the expanded eye sockets. “Promise me you’ll lay low here.”

The sockets briefly flicker closed and open again.

“Sure.”

Tony bundles him back behind the dumpster and hopes Peter’s assent was sincere. All the same, he gets a deep and gut-wrenching feeling of _wrong_ as he takes off in the suit, leaving the kid curled up like a kicked puppy in the road.

“I’ve got this handled,” he’d assured Peter.

Except maybe he doesn’t - not nearly as well as he thinks - because just three minutes later he finds himself suddenly unable to move.

Turns out some of the tech the skeleton guys had managed to get their fleshless hands on is ridiculously overpowered.

Tony’s not expecting the metre-wide plasma beam which sears across the front of his suit, instantly cutting the arc reactor off from the vessel that it powered. As his display blips to black and he begins to plummet towards the ground, Tony finds he can’t breathe, either: a sudden and blinding wash of panic has gripped his throat, because—

_This is – this is Germany. This is New York._

This is a veritable fucking smorgasbord of his worst memories and blackest nightmares served so perfectly to him at this moment that he might puke.

The hundreds of feet between him and the ground - and oblivion - are narrowing far too rapidly and he wishes he could stretch out each second into an hour and his blood vessels are boiling at the surface of his skin and he’s frozen, the suit is frozen – he can’t tell which. Maybe both.

There’s no hope for him. There’s—

_Peter?_

_No. No, no, shit, no—_

Yes.

A blur of fire hydrant red signals Peter’s presence as he swings wildly upwards to meet Tony in the air. Here, racing towards his prone body, is his hope of rescue, and yet the iron hand at his throat tightens further at the sight of that damn kid leaping into the path of danger for him. He tries to shout, to make Peter stop, stand down and let him fall – but the grip on his throat will not budge; no sound escapes.

The gloved hand of his self-sacrificial saviour makes a dent in the bicep of Tony’s suit with a desperate grip. Less than ten feet from the ground, he is yanked away.

At the same time, he picks up on Peter’s cry of agony, muffled by the crushing metal between them, and balks.

Marred road still sweeps by beneath them, but all Tony can process is Peter’s laboured breathing. It’s like a switch has been flipped in his nervous system. He’s ready to claw his way out of the unforgiving vessel to get to the kid. That single, bit-back scream bounces off the walls of his helmet when it grows too oppressive to be held in his mind.

_What happened? Was that from carrying me?_

It seems an age before the momentum of Peter’s swing slows enough to allow him to drop to the ground, still holding tightly to Tony even as they collapse on the wet tarmac. Tony barely registers the sharp thud of impact: blinded by a mortifyingly potent rush of paternal panic, he makes a move to climb out of his suit and curses under his breath when he finds himself entirely immobile.

Suddenly, the Spider-Man mask appears in his field of vision, eye lenses expanded to an extent that Tony might find comedic in a different situation. Peter scrabbles at the front of the suit to reach Tony in any way possible, favouring his right arm and fumbling dizzily.

“Mister Stark,” Tony hears him plead. “Mister _Stark_. Are you awake, are- are you there? How do I get you out, I can’t—”

_Bam!_

Peter’s Spider-sense saves him in the nick of time; he flattens himself against the road and avoids the otherworldly purple fireball by a hair’s breadth. Tony’s close to biting off a scream of frustration at his helplessness at a time when the teenager needs him so badly. Peter’s _right there_ , in trouble, and Tony is utterly powerless.

Couple that with the cloying, rabid panic at his imprisonment in the suit and the fall of a few seconds ago – and the gaunt figure of Tombstone who is currently advancing towards Peter – and Tony’s having a _great_ time.

It’s clearly a struggle for Peter to get up. It's torture for Tony to watch him like this. Tombstone doesn’t stop to monologue again, instead beelining for Peter, who now clutches at his right shoulder – the same side he used to break Tony’s fall.

Tony lets out a panting breath he didn’t know he’d been holding.

Another gaggle of skeleton guys follows in Tombstone’s wake. Turning his narrowing gaze to the kid, Tony watches in terrified curiosity as his demeanour morphs from one born of pain and defeat to the stance of a warrior. His hand drops from where it had cradled his shoulder (Tony knows that Peter hides injuries from him and he sometimes gets away with it, so he can’t gauge from the brave face how severe it is, and it chills him to the bone) and extends in front of him, fingers poised over webshooters and trembling only slightly. He crouches low to the ground.

The next few moments are a blur of a downward spiral: Tony’s vision darkens and his faint grasp of logic slips. He’s trapped in Afghanistan all over again only he can’t move an inch, can’t help Yinsen or Peter. They’re both done for. They’ll both die on his watch. His racing heart is hammering against metal that won’t give, won’t give, won’t give, and he’s trapped.

_Wait._

Tony cracks his eyes open a fraction. The sounds of conflict around him have briefly abated. _That’s either good or really, really not._ He sees nothing for a while, vision smeared with rain and clouded by flashbacks.

And then he sees Tombstone flying backwards and webbed somewhat haphazardly against the Plexiglass window of a thankfully abandoned store.

Peter follows soon after. Not dead. He takes down a last straggling skeleton guy with a punch from the arm Tony remembers him gripping just a minute ago, the arm he hurt trying to save Tony.

Silence again replaces muffled sounds of impact. All Tony can hear is the quiet clang of raindrops pelting the suit. But Peter is back in seconds, the dregs of adrenaline keeping him moving as he quite literally tears the front of the Iron Man suit away.

Tony’s world floods with colour and it’s all too much, too fast; he scrambles instantly out of his personal prison, covering his face with shaking hands.

Through the gaps in his fingers, he can deduce that the street is empty now of any villains or civilians. Cops will be on the scene in the next few minutes, most likely. The sky, although stormy grey, is light enough to remind him he’s not in the velvet oblivion of space or the dull gloom of the cave in Afghanistan. He welcomes the rain on his skin, soaking through a white t-shirt probably stained with motor oil. _Notice details. Ground yourself._ But the physical symptoms are not so easily deterred; when he turns back to Peter, he wonders if the kid can see his heart pumping out of his chest.

He sees Peter, recalls him running stupidly to save him, what could have happened – what he could have just lost before his very eyes - and he _snaps_.

“What the hell was that?”

His tone is murderous as he rounds on the boy. Through fear which manifests as rage and the deluge dripping into his eyes, he can’t make out the expression on the kid’s face. At that moment, it’s not important.

He’s Howard. The side of him he’d worked so hard to suppress has won dominance.

“Do you remember me telling you to _stay put?_ Because I certainly do. You directly disobeyed me when I gave you an _order_ to keep you _safe_. This is when it fucking _matters_!”

He takes a step towards Peter.

“Can you get that into your head? Or is it too full of stupid, reckless, self-sacrificial bullshit?”

Only now does he begin to register Peter’s face. His mask is bunched in a clenched fist, spattered with blood that is beginning to spread and dilute in the downpour.

The next step Tony takes forward is heavy, threatening. He’s spilling over with too many years of demons he’d tried to ignore, taking over his nervous system.

“You don’t understand. I can’t lose you, okay? That’s- that’s just not an option. It would _break_ me. You’ve got no goddamn idea how much it _hurts_ to see you risking your life on patrol. If you _die_ , it’s all on me. If you get _hurt_ —"

Peter flinches away from him.

Tony blinks.

_Hurt._

_Shit._

When Tony fades back into coherency, he knows he’s been gone too long. Peter is barely standing in front of him, shaking with cold and wet and pain and _shock_ , because he’s never before been subject to this side of Tony. The rain running down his pale face mingles with tear tracks; his breaths heave in his chest. He hasn’t broken eye contact without Tony throughout his rant; the betrayal in his unfocused eyes shakes Tony to the core.

“You’re hurt,” Tony repeats dumbly.

Giving in to the clanging ache in his head and the splitting pain in his shoulder and the bullet holes in his soul, Peter hunches in on himself, crossing the ailing arm over his stomach and pressing his good hand against the back of his head. Rain seeps into the vulnerable spot on the nape of his neck. Tony stands motionless.

They burn.

“Oh my God - kid – I’m sorry.”

The shame bubbling on Tony’s skin threatens to suffocate him. He’s Howard. He’s Howard. One day the rage that’s been drilled unwillingly into him will erupt and he doesn’t know when. It’s now. Maybe it’s still there. He’s not safe for Peter to be near. He’s a time bomb.

Peter raises his head as if unsure if he’s permitted to do so. When he speaks, his voice is raw. “I can’t lose you. You’re the only one I have left.”

 _Fuck_.

The kid’s ripped off the cover to his heart and bared it to the both of them, and with it, the stinging truth has been revealed: Tony’s just shouted down a kid who saved him, who’s injured and terrified he’ll lose the only parental figure he has left in the world after too many were so cruelly snatched from him.

How cruelly ironic that the world has taken the nurturers, the supporters, from the kid, and shoved Howard Stark's son in their place.

Glancing down at his hands, he finally remembers to uncurl them from the fists they'd been locked into. _Fists. I could've hit him. I could've hit him._

He doesn’t deserve to come _near_ Peter again.

This is what he tells himself as Peter stands before him, hoping for the slightest signal which might allow him to fall into the arms of his mentor, his comforter, his lifeline, his _dad_.

_Please, let him want to hug me. Let me not be a burden._

When Tony remains still and blank, he takes initiative, guided by the unpleasant spinning sensation in his field of vision which catches him off balance so he near-collapses against Tony’s already rain-soaked t-shirt.

Before he can even process the flurry of damp teenage limbs that have launched at him, Tony is reciprocating the embrace, easing Peter to sit before they both topple over.

“Sorry,” Peter chokes out just as Tony murmurs, “It’s okay.”

Tony’s brow furrows. “Don’t be sorry. _I’m_ sorry.”

_I don’t know where the hell this emotional transparency is coming from but bring it on._

He notices how tension oozes out of Peter with the mere touch of his hands on the kid’s shoulders and wonders why he’d held back for so long from providing him with something that was so vital.

Maybe, just maybe, with a little training and kindness, the fists can be schooled into something gentler.

He breathes. Moving has never been so difficult.

Hesitantly, Tony smooths a dripping lock of Peter’s hair away from his face.

Peter crumbles into a smile. Around them, the rain slows to a drizzle, a watery sun bleeding out from a prison of clouds.

“Let’s have a look at you, kiddo.”

The moment Tony grazes a hand over the offending shoulder, Peter bites back a cry, but instead of pulling away with the sudden pain he leans further in. The crown of his head brushes Tony’s collarbone. “I can catch cars, I can – I don’t know why that was different,” Peter mutters as Tony runs feather-light digits over the area, silently pleading for it not to be—

“Shit.”

Peter’s head darts upwards. “What?”

“It’s dislocated. I’m gonna have to reset it.”

This is a nightmare Tony only wishes he could wake up from. Peter’s advancements mean the shoulder will heal incorrectly in minutes. He’s got to do this himself and cause the kid even more pain at his hands in the process.

Whatever assumptions he has about the kid’s reaction are blown out of the water: Peter sucks in a breath, lowers himself to lie on the ground, angles his face away with gritted teeth, and presents his arm waveringly to Tony, full of trust. “Okay. G- go on.”

Tony runs his hand down to briefly squeeze Peter’s gloved one because it feels _right_. He might deem himself unworthy of this kid, but the adoring way Peter fixes his gaze on him speaks otherwise. “You’re a trooper, bud.”

Despite it all, the comment draws a smile from Peter.

The procedure is branded into the depths of Tony’s memory, through no active effort of his own - more likely a boredom-fuelled Google search which he picked up inadvertently. _Position the injured arm away from your body at a 90-degree angle. Slowly and firmly pull on the arm, holding the wrist and elbow, to create traction._

The knowledge doesn’t make it any easier. He can’t bear to hurt Peter any more.

_As soon as the shoulder relocates, the level of pain associated with the injury will reduce significantly._

He curls his free hand around the crook of the kid’s arm and pulls. Peter’s searching eyes rest on him; they bloom with unbearable trust.

Tony feels an unsettling _pop_ in Peter’s arm – sees a sharp flicker of a wince run through his body and hears the short cry from between his gritted teeth – and it’s done.

Peter huffs out a breath, eyebrows loosening from where they’d been tensely knitted together. “Is that it?”

Tony can’t help but laugh. “Yeah, kiddo, we’re all done here.” He swallows, and ventures, “You did… great.”

Immediately, Peter rushes to sit up and feels a wave of light-headedness grip him.

“Woah, Spidey. Steady.”

The soft reprimand seems to break something in Peter, who gnaws on his lip as he talks a little tearfully. “I'm sorry, Mister Stark, I'm so sorry, but I really was feeling alright in the alleyway and I felt like something was gonna go wrong and I looked out and you were just – falling, and I- but I couldn't just _not_ go and help you because I-I'm Spiderman and you're - uh…”

A deafening silence falls between them until Tony insists: “It's okay, it's totally fine. I do understand, kid. I really… I didn’t mean to yell. That wasn't the right way to go about - about anything. I’m just glad you’re safe, alright?”

“Yeah, I get it,” Peter huffs distractedly, followed by a laugh that sounds closer to a wince. The way he shakes water out of his eyes is determined yet almost defensive, and at first Tony is almost offended by how the distracted teenager seems to blank his uncharacteristically heartfelt apology. 

“I'll just…” he ventures quietly, casting about for something nearby to lean on, and Tony mentally slaps himself round the head.

He’s struck with a dark image of an even younger Peter, before anyone had discovered his night job as a superhero, in a similar condition - or worse - with no one to turn to, simply hoping his injuries would eventually heal, hurtling towards a clumsy form of self-sufficiency where he picked himself up in the absence of a helping hand. Now Tony has the opportunity to change that for good, and yet it takes a ridiculous amount of mental coercion to break him out of his own daze.

_Move, you moron. You're supposed to be taking care of him._

Peter seems intent on struggling to his feet, so Tony reaches for his shoulder and side in a bid to avoid the newly-reset arm as he helps the kid, but the second his hesitant hand makes contact with the frayed section of the suit, Peter yelps, taking a stumbling step away.

_Ribs._ “Oh, shit, sorry.”

In an uncharacteristic gesture, Tony cups his hand around the back of Peter’s neck. The kid curls a hand around the wrist that rests on his shoulder as he rises unsteadily; his head bows and his eyelids flutter.

“Don't pass out on me,” Tony cautions.

Although Peter looks pale as death, eyelids hooded, he protests, “No - it's… not that.”

“What is it then?”

“It's just… it feels nice.”

Tony's eyebrows raise of their own accord. But rather than pull away at the admission, he gently massages the area, hoping to work out the knots of tension at the nape of his neck. “How are you feeling?” he asks quietly, stooping a little to find the kid’s face beneath his dripping hair.

It takes a while to discern the small sniffs from over the sound of the hammering rain.

_Shit. Did I do something?_

The suppressed sobs sound almost breathless and heartrendingly _young_.

Slowly, Tony realises that his thumb and finger are still rubbing circles onto the back of Peter’s neck, and from there even his thick skull can connect the dots.

It wasn't the overwhelming threat of Tombstone, nor the way he'd been battered by injuries, nor his last-second swing to save Tony, nor even the final, desperate fight while the man who was supposed to protect him lay useless in a lifeless suit, which pushed Peter over the edge; it was the unexpected gentle touch in the midst of dizzy agony, soft comfort dissolving a front of toughness, physical contact after Tony's selfishly neglected to provide it for him.

What the kid must need is a hug, but Tony, for the life of him, can't bring himself to close the gap.

“Kid?” he ventures, the response to which is a stiffening of limbs and a shaky, “Sorry.”

Tony is acutely aware of the fact that they’ve stood in the rain so long his clothes are running with it, in a very exposed portion of street which will probably be crawling with cops in minutes, and that Peter’s mask is off. Sweeping his gaze over the kid, soaked to the bone, littered with small cuts and bruises and swaying a little as he cries, and decides he’s in no fit condition to make his own way home. He sticks out a hand to call his suit.

“Let's get you home.” Tony squeezes the kid’s neck encouragingly. He's choosing to avoid mentioning the crying thing. _Kid deserves a little dignity after the yelling._

“Okay,” Peter breathes so quietly Tony can barely make it out.

Having a leaky suit while it rains is one thing; stepping into Mark 42 sopping wet is entirely another. For the moment, he brushes aside the unpleasant sensation - he can take a shower later, but if Peter’s ribs are cracked and they re-heal wrong they’re in for trouble. Time is of the essence.

The kid is still frozen like a deer in headlights but for his quivering shoulders. Tapping his chin gently, Tony speaks haltingly: “Is it alright if I…” He mimes bundling Peter up in a bridal carry. “Don't wanna pop the arm right back out.”

From behind his curtain of hair, Peter nods.

It's admittedly very endearing, the way the wiped-out teenager melts into Tony's arms. _We should do this more often. Not the fighting-half-to-the-death –_ God, _no. Just – this._

“FRIDAY,” he commands after momentarily switching off his speaker, “Turn on the kid’s suit heater, will you? I'm getting the impression he's not gonna do it himself.”

The sigh of relief he hears as the Spider-Man suit lightly steams turns up the corners of his mouth.

Tony charges his thrusters and they rise above the mess on the street, heading for home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Seeing the hugely positive response to this fic and watching it grow has been a joy, so I'd like to send huge virtual hugs to everyone who's viewed, kudos-ed and commented! Next chapter is coming your way on Tuesday the 17th :)


	5. Have We Not Hope in the Deepest of the Dark

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The dance of light and shadows flickers to a halt as the last scene of the movie comes on and Elio’s character stares straight into the camera, tears clinging to his lashes. A guitar strums in the background and the lyrics are just barely overlaid in a whisper.
> 
> _I have loved you for the last time  
>  Is it a video? Is it a video?_
> 
> Tony takes a moment to just look at Peter and study him, his profile, the glow of the outline of his nose and cheekbones and lashes in the low light from the screen.
> 
> And he is struck dumb with the thought: _You know I’d do anything just to make you never hurt again_.
> 
> Maybe Peter has heard him, somehow, in that weird semi-telepathic connection they sometimes have, because he moves again to curl up bodily against the heat of Tony. It feels a little like acknowledgment and so very much like a promise.  
> \--  
> Difficult conversations finally take place. Peter learns to open up about the rumors and the bullying, and Tony learns to be quietly supportive. And finally, Peter makes a surprising request.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're nearing the end, folks. That's all I can say.
> 
> No trigger warnings for this chapter, but _Call Me By Your Name_ is mentioned, so if that makes you sad...well, me too ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
> 
> Theme song and title inspiration for this chapter: ["Are We Not One" by Young Oceans](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nxd22B7NURI)

After Tony’s epiphany about his and Peter’s tug-of-war relationship over touch starvation and avoidance, he truly does his best to reward the kid with more grounding touches from time to time. He throttles his misgivings--which love to knock at his door every morning on schedule, without reprieve--and, gradually, finds himself patting Peter’s shoulder when he comes home from school, brushing his arm or his elbow in encouragement as they stand side by side in the lab, or giving him an aggressive noogie when they can’t agree on whose tally in Scrabble is the accurate one. 

He doubts, though, if he’ll ever draw the courage to go in for a hug again unprompted. Just a casual embrace, not necessitated by talks of guardianship or panic attacks or bullies. Over time, Tony learns that hugging is not the best way to wake Peter on the few occasions that he actually cries out in his nightmares; instead, the kid prefers for his shoulder to be shaken and his hand held and, sometimes, for Tony to tentatively muss up his hair in circles. Tony tries not to wonder too often if Peter’s aversion to full-on hugs on the bad nights has more to do with the remembrance of May doing the same for him, or with any subconscious lack of trust in his mentor. Or, or--and this is the bullet that digs into the man on the daily--perhaps Peter is so goddamn scared of getting that close again to someone who could abandon him any day.

It makes Tony’s chest clench, when he thinks back on his conversation with Peter in which the kid laid bare his fears of losing the last person who was able and willing to care for him. To love him. Tony would sign over the entirety of his wealth--chuck all his tech in the bin, lose an arm, hell, probably go through some choice traumatic experiences all over again--if only he could have the assurance that Peter knew, without a shadow of a doubt, how much Tony loves him.

And that’s the sticking point, isn’t it? How to tell Peter he _loves_ him, when the mere notion of a hug downright terrifies Tony.

He reflects idly on the fact that after his first kiss with Pepper, it still took him ages to warm up to her unexpected embraces without freezing up at the foreignness of the emotional intimacy. He even remembers how the first time Pepper came up from behind him in the kitchen and wrapped her arms loosely around his waist, he had to stick his head in the fridge pretending to search for the strawberry cream cheese and stay in that ridiculous position for several seconds while he blinked away the moisture in his eyes.

Thank God he knows himself well enough now to turn away his face, just in case, when Peter initiates the occasional surprise hug. Still, on most days Tony knows he is too much of a coward to take the first step in those kinds of things without tearing up all over again.

“You’re crying, Mr. Stark,” Peter points out one night in a gravelly voice of supreme teenage disinterest. They’re both on the couch in the dark, illuminated by flashes of light and shadows from the TV, and Peter has burrowed like a curly-mopped hedgehog in the folds of the MIT hoodie he snagged from Tony and the ridiculous pile of blankets from their rooms. May’s T-shirt quilt, sporting her crooked stitches on the decorative edges and somehow still smelling faintly of her, forms the top layer of Peter’s blanket burrito.

“Of course I’m crying,” Tony grumbles. “Remind me again why we’re watching a bunch of emotionally constipated guys who are doomed to never be together?”

“They are _gay_ and _star-crossed lovers_ , thank you.” Peter has the audacity to sniff. “And _Call Me By Your Name_ is supposed to be more about the beauty of what could have been rather than pandering to people’s need for a happily ever after.”

Well, shit. Tony tries not to think too hard about the unconscious parallels to Peter’s own situation. And per usual, he fails spectacularly.

The unnatural pause in their commentary seems to alert Peter to the fact that he’s said something that strikes a painful chord with Tony. Quickly he tacks on, “Also, Hollywood can’t produce a single movie about gays without making it tragic.”

Tony runs his finger around the bottom of the bowl between them and licks it clean of popcorn butter, eliciting a quiet _eww, gross, Mr. Stark_ from the boy. He rolls his eyes. “I could think of a couple exceptions.”

“Okay, maybe that’s true, but you gotta admit that the general narrative in these sorts of things is kinda depressing.”

“Ergo my question earlier: Why the hell are we watching this?”

“It’s cathartic.” Again with the insolent teenage sniffing. “Did you know Aristotle thought Greek tragedies served a great purpose for the audience because it helped them purge negative emotions by making them cry?”

“Not totally convinced it’s purging that’s going on here and not, oh, I dunno, heaping loads of pain and suffering on yourself over fictional characters that have no right to make you feel so attached.”

Once again Tony realizes belatedly the veiled parallelism between his statement and his own feelings toward Peter. Which, ouch. Could his brain-to-mouth filter please get its act together?

Peter peers up at him in the dark from behind the edge of his hood. The corner of his mouth is turning upward in the tiniest of smirks. “Is Tony Stark actually having a genuine connection to an _indie movie_?”

“Shut up. It won an Academy Award, which is very mainstream and totally not indie.”

“ _And_ researched an indie movie?”

It’s Tony’s turn to scrunch up his nose and sniff. “You’ve been going on about the book ever since you got laid out with that bullet to the leg. Which, don’t forget, you’re still not forgiven. The next time I call you on patrol and I hear the word _guns_ in the same sentence as _Spider-Man_ , I swear you’re not going to see the--”

“Breaking news: Tony Stark, genius billionaire philanthropist and secret sensitive soul, deflecting once again to avoid discussion of his recent interest in indie gay movies and emotions,” Peter intones.

Tony turns to stare at him, open-mouthed, his arms folded over his chest. He catches the roguish glint in Peter’s eyes and the two have a staring contest of about three seconds before Tony scoops up the popcorn bowl without further ado and upends it over Peter’s head.

“Hey!”

“Hey yourself. I am _not_ deflecting.”

“I think the popcorn bowl speaks well enough for itself,” Peter mumbles. His fingers grope at the rim of the bowl and push it up a couple inches so he can peek up at Tony again.

Tony graces him with another eyeroll. “Fine. So maybe I researched a little bit. It doesn’t hurt to know something about your favorite things.”

The shy grin freezes on Peter’s face. He blinks, swallows. A blanket of woolen awareness has suddenly descended on them.

“Well, thanks.”

“Trying not to totally suck at this guardian thing, y’know.”

“I know. You’re doing a pretty good job at it. Aside from the whole, uh, you know, feeding me leek pot pies and turning bowls upside-down on my head.”

“Leeks are good for you. Besides, I _am_ trying to impress my fiancée and show her I can handle one spider-teen responsibly when she’s not around.”

“Is that what you told her when she asked about the broken chandelier?”

“Okay, now hold on a minute, first off--”

Peter cuts him off with quiet peals of laughter. It’s shocking and disconcerting, the ripple of soft joy that creeps up on Tony as he stares slack-jawed at his ward and gets swept up in his own wave of giggles. 

Happy. Almost carefree.

Have they actually arrived?

Perhaps not quite. All too soon Peter’s laughter tapers off, and his gaze meets Tony’s in a moment of profound and unfettered pain before swerving off to the side to fix itself again on the screen.

“It’s nice, you know,” Peter speaks up again a few minutes later. He slides sideways till his head is tipped against the round of Tony’s shoulder.

Tony snags a corner of Peter’s t-shirt quilt and makes a fuss of arranging it over himself. “What is?”

“Being around you and Ms. Potts. Pretending we’re scared shitless of her but also being able to enjoy it when she’s home and it’s the three of us.”

“I don’t know about you, but I for one am not pretending.”

Tony doesn’t have to even glance down to know the kid is giving him an extreme version of the Parker eyeroll.

“I’m glad to hear it, though,” Tony goes on in a softer tone. “She really loves you, y’know.”

Peter gnaws at his lip. “Don’t really know why, but ’s nice.”

Tony pinches the kid’s arm under the blanket and smirks when the boy yelps. “Don’t do that. You know exactly why. You’re kind, always helpful, really smart and also stupidly self-sacrificial.”

“Wow, you talking about me or yourself now?”

“Prepubescent mutant,” Tony shoots back, with no real heat to it. “I mean it. We talk a lot about you, actually.”

There’s a sudden movement as Peter sinks deeper into the blanket burrito, presumably to hide the growing flush on his face.

Tony hesitates before he continues. _Oh, what the hell_ , he thinks. If they’re already having a casual and semi-not-awkward heart-to-heart anyway, with the welcome distraction of a bunch of pining characters on screen, then he might as well plunge into it headfirst.

“Pep really loved May too, you know.”

“Yeah,” the kid says, maybe a little too quickly. It does nothing to hide the unsurprising rasp in his voice. “May loved her too.”

Tony’s mouth pulls upward in a wry little smile. “Force of a hurricane, those two, I tell ya. I can’t even begin to imagine what kind of state we’d be in if we joined households.”

Tony might have gambled with pressing further into the hypothetical scenarios and mentions of May, but he breathes a quiet sigh of relief when Peter rewards him with a choked-off little laugh. “They’d love schedules,” the kid says. “And whiteboards. So many whiteboards. I can’t even remember how many Expo markers I tripped over back home.”

“Envelopes,” Tony adds with a snap of his fingers.

“Oh my God, so true. All the receipts and pocket money in envelopes. And over-packing!”

“And yelling at us when they realize we forgot half a week’s worth of underwear?”

Peter swivels his head upward and wrinkles his nose at Tony. “Gross. Sounds like a _you_ problem.”

Tony prattles blithely on. “And also yelling at you together every time you get hurt on patrol, hm? Sounds like a _you_ problem?”

“Ms. Potts already told me about all the times you almost gave her a heart condition to match yours.” Peter sticks out his tongue at him.

“Excuse me, and what about all the bullies you pretend don’t exist until one of us gets a call that you’ve had a showdown outside homeroom on a Tuesday morning right before your Spanish presentation?”

“An incredibly specific and fantastical situation, if you ask me.” The jest in Peter’s tone is belied by how he suddenly slumps down, mood obviously dampened.

Oh, dear. Sounds like Tony has hit a sensitive topic. Time to activate the Supertherapist to the Rescue Protocol.

“Judging by how clammed up you got all of a sudden, I’m guessing it’s not so specific and fantastical.”

Tony stays still, so, so still, to communicate the silent promise that he will not push Peter beyond his limits in this conversation. Not like how he did last time when he triggered the kid in the lab.

Four and a half seconds. Tony knows because he counted.

“People are dumb.”

“Specifically, hormonal and ignorant teenagers in a confined space for eight hours a day are dumb, but you’re right,” Tony acquiesces. “Humanity is pretty dumb.”

“You’re not dumb.”

“Agree to disagree. So, what’s going on, bud? Is it that creature Eugene?”

“ _Flash_ ,” Peter corrects him with an almost fond sigh of exasperation, “is no longer bothering me. Not after he got back from the Blip and found out his parents were divorced and his crush was five years older than him and there are way more important things than calling me ‘Penis Parker’.”

Tony huffs in amusement. “Glad to hear it. Not the divorce, I mean. But. You know.”

“Yeah.”

“So it’s someone else?”

Peter hedges. “It’s nothing really new.”

“Doesn’t mean it isn’t harmful.” Tony cocks a brow in his direction.

“Urgh, why do you have to sound so wise at times like this.”

“Hm, maybe because I’m right? Broken clock, right twice a day, all that jazz.”

Peter fixes him with an unimpressed stare. “Self-burn.”

“As much as I appreciate the _Brooklyn Nine-Nine_ reference, we’re not playing a game of trivia right now.” Tony nudges him gently. “Spill.”

The muscle in Peter’s jaw jumps. “You know how people were always suspicious about my...internship with you.”

“Hence why I asked about the Lightning Rod kid.”

Peter gives him a look. 

“ _Flash_. Fine. He was the one who spread the rumor you were lying about the internship, wasn’t he?”

“Yeah, but like I said, he stopped after the Blip happened and...all that.”

Geez, it’s like pulling teeth with the kid sometimes. “So it’s someone else? Are they saying the same old, same old?”

“Sort of.” Peter rakes a hand through his hair. “After May--she--after th-the accident, they started...asking...more like assuming…”

Okay, so Tony will admit he does not like where Peter’s tone is heading.

Gently, ever so gently, he prods: “Assuming what, Pete?”

“...That I’m related to you somehow.”

It takes a minute to get a reaction out of Tony, but it’s only because the answer is a bit underwhelming. This is not news to him, unfortunately. The tabloids have been all over the story of Peter being spotted around the Tower ever since May’s death and have been tossing around theories of the kid being his illegitimate son. Not that he was ever going to bring up the ugly details of paparazzi life to his grieving ward.

“I guess I can see why they’d think you’re my kid,” Tony begins reasonably. “I mean, in a way, that’s what we are now, aren’t we?”

Peter’s mouth twists a little. “Yeah, no, it actually--well. It’s not that bad. It’s just...when they assume the other thing…”

Tony’s heart thumps.

“...Peter?”

Peter gnaws at the hangnail on his thumb in a vicious movement. Acting out of instinct, Tony grabs his wrist and maneuvers his hand away with a gentle tug.

“Peter...are they saying we’re...involved?”

Nothing for a long moment, and then a furious, red-eyed nod.

Tony inhales sharply. “I’m sorry, Pete.”

The kid’s jaw is clenching and unclenching. “Not your fault.”

“I know that, but you’re right. People _are_ dumb. No, scratch that, they’re not just dumb. They’re ridiculous and disgusting and frankly I kinda wish you had spider venom as part of your package of freaky powers right now.”

The boy replies with a quiet, reluctant huff.

“I hate to tell you this, but that’s been a pesky theory running through the tabloids recently. I mean, we’re talking sleazy gossip columns, not reputable newspapers, so who gives a crap about what they say if smart people are reading, right? But it’s just--” Fucked up is what it is, Tony thinks. “It’s messed up that kids are spreading this bullshit around too. Who do I need to report to the principal, kid? I’m setting up a meeting ASAP.”

“It’s not anyone in particular.”

“Peter…” Tony says with a warning edge.

“I’m not lying, I really don’t know who started it.”

“Well, then,” says Tony with a grim scowl, “Looks like your principal is gonna have a lot of investigating to do.”

Uncharacteristically, the boy holds his silence for several long seconds after Tony’s little declaration of war. Under ordinary circumstances, Peter would either be arguing with him to just leave the damn bullies alone because he could handle it. Suffice it to say that the kid’s quietness now is a little more than concerning.

“...Kiddo? Is there anything else?”

Only then, at Tony’s barely-whispered utterance of his nickname, does Peter look up at him again. “No,” he whispers back.

“You sure?”

“I’m sure.”

The dance of light and shadows flickers to a halt as the last scene of the movie comes on and Elio’s character stares straight into the camera, tears clinging to his lashes. A guitar strums in the background and the lyrics are just barely overlaid in a whisper.

_I have loved you for the last time  
Is it a video? Is it a video?_

Tony takes a moment to just look at Peter and study him, his profile, the glow of the outline of his nose and cheekbones and lashes in the low light from the screen.

And he is struck dumb with the thought: _You know I’d do anything just to make you never hurt again_.

Maybe Peter has heard him, somehow, in that weird semi-telepathic connection they sometimes have, because he moves again to curl up bodily against the heat of Tony. It feels a little like acknowledgment and so very much like a promise.

_I have touched you for the last time  
Is it a video? Is it a video?_

“Y’know, I probably would have had a hard time telling May about something like that,” Peter breathes.

“Yeah?” Tony plays with a loose stitch on his corner of the t-shirt quilt. “Why’s that, you think?”

“I hated making her worry. Even if, like, stupidly enough, me not saying anything tended to make her worry even more. I just...couldn’t ever bring myself to say something that would make her sad, even if she said she could handle it. Even if she said she was supposed to handle it.”

“That’s what parents are for.”

“Yeah. I know.”

The credits roll to a close. The music swells, crests on a sweet note, fades to silence.

“But I guess the reason why it’s easier to talk to you about these things...I mean...I thought at first it was because we’re both in the superhero thing. I mean, I’m not a _super_ superhero, I’m a local guy, friendly neighborhood Spider-Man, just helping out--”

Tony cuts him off with a truncated little chuckle. “Yeah, I get it. For the record though, you are a superhero.”

“Po-tay-to, po-tah-to. But okay.”

“You were saying…”

“Well, I thought it was because we were both doing the hero thing, but then I realized...maybe it’s because I don’t feel like telling you this stuff makes you sad. More like...mad. Like, both you and May would storm the principal’s office, probably, but I know she’d be crying a little in bed at night when she thinks I can’t hear her.”

Sounds painfully like the kid is speaking from personal experience. The memory of Ben Parker’s family portrait with May and Peter flits through Tony’s mind.

But, oh, how the kid is wrong. Tony is sad. He _is_ angry, yes, but he’s also filled with this wide and indescribable and numbing pit of fucking _sadness_ when he looks at Peter. Maybe decades of emotional repression at the hands of Howard trained most of the crying out of him, but damn it, even Tony can’t deny how deep he aches for the boy when he glimpses his retreating figure turning in for the night and instead sees his own shadow of pain and burdens resting on young shoulders.

Yet it’s not as if Tony is about to speak any of this aloud. Not here, not now. If this is what drives Peter to open up to him, then far be it from Tony to spurn the kid’s trust and honesty.

Instead, what he chokes out is: “You know me. Avenger and all that.”

Peter’s face creases in a semblance of a smile. 

“You know,” Tony says, “I bet May’s real happy right now that you’re able to talk about this. What you’re going through. God knows she didn’t raise you to be an emotionally constipated little shit.”

“Again: talking about me or talking about yourself?”

Tony jabs him in the ribs, maybe harder than necessary. “I take it back, you’re responsible for the _little shit_ part all on your own.”

“Hey!” Peter jabs him back, and ouch, okay, maybe that was unwise on Tony’s part to goad a volatile teen with super-strength, but he’s having fun.

“Thanks, by the way,” Peter says, more quietly. “For making it easy to talk to you.”

“That one’s all on you, not me. But you’re welcome. And hey, you know what? I can make a public statement about the guardianship any time. Just say the word.”

Tony’s mind flits to the stack of papers in the drawer of his nightstand. Dare he bring up the subject of adoption now?

But old habits die hard, and fear overtakes him before the thing called love can press any further against its cage inside him. His mouth snaps shut.

“Er, maybe rain check on that one,” Peter says. “But, uh, I guess I could...if you...well, maybe…”

“Name it, kid.”

Peter gulps in a breath, lets it all out in a tumble of words. “Do you think maybe we could go by the cemetery tomorrow after school and just visit her?”

The notion blindsides Tony so hard that he’s speechless for a second. Peter has never asked to see May’s grave, not since the funeral, not even at Tony’s subtle and sometimes not-so-subtle hint-dropping.

“I guess we could do that,” Tony says in a voice so mild it belies the sheer intensity of emotion that is quaking inside him in this moment. 

Peter casts him a thin smile. “And also…”

“Well, we’re just full of requests tonight, aren’t we?”

Peter slaps at his chest with the floppy sleeve of his sweatshirt. “Can I maybe, possibly, uh...get a hug?”

Tony’s about to point out that the kid is practically koala’ed up against him, but the better part of him realizes that the kid is asking for something proper. Something real.

A conscious touch to ground him.

And damned he’ll be if he will deny the kid anything.

“Sure,” he breathes, and there’s this persistent pain in his chest that hurts almost on the side of joyful and good, and it continues to softly explode within him like fireworks even as the two of them stand up from the couch in a tangle of blankets and move toward each other.

For the briefest moment Tony freezes up. He doesn’t know what to do with his own body and he stands there rooted to the carpet like some scruffy statue. But then Peter’s arms find their way around his middle and the rest of Tony’s senses kick in, and he settles his own arms around the boy’s shoulders. The kid is starting to grow taller, enough that it’s no longer so easy to drape an arm around the back of Pete’s neck, but nothing will stop them from slotting together like they were meant to embrace.

Like they were meant to admit, in the silence and the darkness, the music and light of their found love.

“Mr. Stark?” Peter mumbles against his shoulder.

“Yeah, buddy?”

“Can you be there tomorrow? With me?”

Tony gives him a squeeze for good measure. “Always.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, ngl, I did actually cry writing this. There's something about midnight conversations on a couch in the dark that, like, get to me.
> 
> As always, we'd love to throw out another huge thank you to each and every one of you who's been reading, clicking kudos and leaving lovely comments from the start. Knowing you like our content means the absolute world to us <3 
> 
> Final chapter hopefully coming out on Saturday!! -kaleb


	6. Saving What We Love

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Mister Stark?”  
> “Hm?”  
> “Are you… are- are you alright?”  
> “Yeah. Yeah.”  
> Peter studies him.  
> “You ready to go?”  
> “Uh huh.”  
> They’re almost out of the graveyard when Tony finally spits it out. “Kid.”  
> “Yeah?”  
> “I’m… I’m proud of you. I want you to know that.”  
> The kid just falls into his side. Tony can feel the tearful grin against his shoulder as they return to the car.  
> \--  
> The conclusion. Tony and Peter's relationship is put to the test by time and wrong assumptions, but when have they been anything but tough?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here it is, the final chapter... a couple of days later than you might have expected, but here we are XD  
> In my defense, this chapter is almost 7k, much longer than I'd initially anticipated, because there were a lot of ends I wanted to tie up to create a satisfying conclusion. Hope you all enjoy as always!  
> \- Daisy

May’s favourite flowers are – _were_ – Michaelmas daisies.

Tony hadn’t expected to learn this at 8:43am in the local Stop & Shop, and yet here he is, Peter stilling suddenly beside him as they pause at the flower stand.

He reaches for a bouquet of the delicately lilac flowers. Pauses. Then, with a minute dip of his head as if in apology for his next action, he hands the daisies to Tony and pulls out one bunch of just-blooming sunflowers and another of sweet peas.

As the daisies’ cloying perfume wafts its way to Tony’s nostrils, he tries to make sense of the abundance of flowers but can’t connect the dots until he glimpses the glance Peter shoots him from beneath lowered eyelids, encompassing a galaxy in a blink.

_Oh, God._

Three bunches of flowers sit slowly leaking water into the back seat of the car like three bleeding hearts left behind. Where Tony might usually shuffle whatever playlist he knew was running through Peter’s head by the snatches of tunes he hummed, he responds to the kid’s silent huffing of breath onto the window by keeping the drive to the cemetery similarly quiet. The way Peter has curled up against the window catches at a loose thread of a memory: May texting him a photo late at night of a familiar figure littered with bruising but swaddled in a ratty Avengers blanket, an image of the present recreating the past with bittersweet clarity.

The graveyard is huge and hauntingly crowded, calling for a respectfully slow trudge to the well-worn spot they’re looking for. Slowly, Peter shifts the daisies in his arms and ventures to the pale marble slab bearing May’s name. The purple of the flowers and the off-white of the gravestone marks out the site like a foreboding beacon among duller, decaying graves, as if the universe is undecided as to whether to mark it out as heavenly or hellish. Both.

Peter lays the daisies in front of May’s grave. Then, presenting the sunflowers with a reverence that blurs the edges of Tony’s vision, he sets them so they lean against the grave just a few feet to the right, the tip of a radiant petal seeming to point to the name _Ben Parker._

“Hi, Ben,” he breathes close to the stone.

Returning to Tony for the final bunch of flowers, he parts his mouth halfway but says nothing, simply gazing up at the man. Tony allows a sad smile to curl up the corners of his mouth, nods slightly in affirmation. 

The final trip is just three steps longer than the first; it seems heartrendingly poetic that they all be laid to rest together.

Richard and Mary Parker share a grave and a bouquet of sweet peas.

“Hey, mom. Dad.”

By the time the kid has returned to stand before the three graves, Tony has convinced himself it’s not his place to stay here. The air itself feels cloyingly private, so he murmurs to Peter, “Want me to tap out for a bit?”

But Peter grips his hand reflexively. “Could you… stay with me?”

“Whatever you want.”

As if preparing to deliver a speech, the kid shifts a little from foot to foot before the impassive audience of marble before him, still loosely clasping Tony’s hand between his own fingers.

He sighs, the fog of breath leaving his mouth like a purge of whatever inhibitions had kept him from visiting May before now.

“Sorry I didn’t come earlier,” he begins haltingly, before rephrasing: “Oh – I started with an apology. You always said not to do that, May. I’m sorry. Wait.”

And then, to Tony’s surprise, he breaks out into a breathy laugh. Tony cracks a fond smile.

“But- yeah, I didn’t visit for a while, because… it was too hard to see all of you.” Peter swallows hard, seeming smaller than he is. “It was like… I was scared of looking at everything I’d lost and - and seeing that it was more than I have.”

A sharp intake of breath precedes his next words, evoking an image in Tony’s mind of the kid pulling words from his mind as one would wrench out a knife from a wound. Agonising, but essential.

“It took me a while, but I realised that wasn’t true. I’ve got lots – _so_ much. Ben, you always taught me to be – to be grateful just for the sun coming up in the morning, and… I hung on to that. Until I- I, you know, I found enough sense to see… all the good left behind that I could be g-glad for. Even w-without – without—”

Peter cuts off with a sniff, tone splintering under the duress of the same uprising of emotion that pushes tears down his cheeks and into the crevice of his still-smiling mouth.

There’s only half a second of hesitation before Tony loops an arm around the kid’s shoulders, curling a hand over his far shoulder and squeezing lightly. When the two lock eyes, there’s an inexplicable glint of happiness – _relief_ , even – in Peter’s irises, although belied by the shamefully beautiful glint of moisture in each corner. Tony blinks slowly in comfort, sets his mouth in a fond line; Peter’s mouth quirks in response.

He’s so proud of the kid he might just burst. God, he’s a dad. He’s such a _dad_ , and the word sends a thrill through him wholly unlike the jolt of fear it had prompted before.

“I’ve got Mister Stark, most of all,” the kid continues, and Tony swears his heart leaves his body. “I know you’d like him, Mum, Dad, Ben. May, you pretended to hate him, but it turns out the two of you were texting about me the whole time, so…”

Tony can’t help but break into scoffs of laughter, jostling the kid lightly with the hand that still rests across his shoulders.

“Yeah.” Peter sighs, and it’s neither happy nor unhappy. “He – we – he’s taking good care of me. Don’t worry, May. I promise I’ll…”

Peter sets his shoulders, warrior-like.

“I promise I’ll be alright.”

A spell must have lifted from the cemetery at the utterance, because the very atmosphere seems to clear, as does the resolve in Tony’s mind to make sure that promise is kept.

“I love you,” finishes Peter tremulously, sweeping his gaze over the four parents he’s outlived in just sixteen years, the four losses he’s thrived through. The four possibilities that never were - and the one that is, as he catches Tony’s eye with a nod as if to say, _I’m done._ He seems to have forgotten the continued passage of tears from his eyes to his chin.

What Tony hasn’t acknowledged yet is that he’s crying too.

“Mister Stark?”

“Hm?”

“Are you… are- are you alright?”

“Yeah. Yeah.”

Peter studies him.

“You ready to go?” Tony resumes, swiping a sleeve subtly over his eyes.

“Uh huh.”

They’re almost out of the graveyard when Tony finally spits it out. “Kid.”

“Yeah?”

“I’m… I’m proud of you. I want you to know that.”

The kid just falls into his side. Tony can feel the tearful grin against his shoulder as they return to the car.

\--

_“How’d he deal with it?”_

“Better than I could have imagined. He came out with this speech and – yeah, he was alright.”

The wide, shit-eating grin Tony wears is a trademark of the rare moments when he gets the privilege of boasting about Peter. Rotating lazily in a desk chair in his workshop, _weird green smoothie thingy_ in hand, Pepper on the phone, Peter just a few rooms away – he’s exactly where he wants to be.

_“And what does he think about adoption?”_

Tony swears he can hear the smile in Pepper’s question.

He swallows the next mouthful of smoothie a little too heavily. “Uh… yeah, I haven’t brought that up yet.”

_“Not at all? What happened to the ‘free communication’ thing you kept rambling on about?”_

“Hey. It takes _time_ , I’m not magic. I just - haven’t got round to it.”

_“Oh, sure.”_

“What are you trying to say?” Neatly quirked eyebrow aside, Tony won’t kid that he doesn’t know _exactly_ what Pepper’s trying to say.

_“Tony, you’re_ ready. He’s _ready. You can’t just keep avoiding this one – I know you know that – because you’re not the only one that’ll get hurt if you do.”_

Just as he’s about to throw a meaningless quip at her, Tony changes tack. “How do you know he’s ready?”

_“Do you have to ask?”_ Pepper replies. _“He’s so settled at the Tower. Remember when he used to ask permission for everything?”_

Tony closes his eyes, smiles in exasperated reminiscence. “Damn kid.”

With a fervency that compels Tony to absorb every word she says, Pepper pushes on. _“The way he looks at you – have you not noticed the way he just… looks at you for ages? And the way you two act around each other… you’d think he was yours. It’s no wonder the media is going insane.”_

Blowing out a loud breath, Tony winces. “Yeah. That.”

He’s been dreading facing the growing tidal wave of obscene rumours circulating the media, for fear of… a whole bunch of things.

_“The adoption would be the perfect time to make a public statement,”_ suggests Pepper innocently, only a thin veneer of flippancy covering the probable fact that she’s diagrammed this entire thing.

Slamming down his now-empty glass on the worktable, Tony rouses himself with a rush of adrenaline that feels too purposeful to ignore. “Okay. Okay. I’ll do it. You win again.”

_“Oh no, what a tragedy for you,”_ Pepper bites back, tone triumphant and dripping with sweet sarcasm.

“When are you back from Singapore again?”

_“Four days,”_ is the curt answer.

“Alright, see you then, you dictator.”

_“Don’t defend,”_ she chides. _“You know you want to tell him.”_

The words, teasing as they are, stop him in his tracks. He grips the phone closer to his ear. “What the hell _do_ I tell him?”

There’s a pause, long enough to make Tony wonder if the connection has phased out.

_“The truth.”_

\--

Peter evidently hears him coming, because he’s already set down his phone and pillowed his sideways-turned head on a hand as he reclines on his bed by the time Tony inches through the half-open door. Inside is a haven months in the making:noise-dampening posters and blankets draped across walls, stacks of textbooks and biographies and fantasy novels surrounding the already-full bookcase, a wide desk scattered with Lego remnants and half-finished sketches, a pair of noise-cancelling headphones ready for action on the bedside table, even a cluster of glow-in-the dark star stickers adorning the ceiling (Tony had caught the teenager eyeing them half-shamefully in Target and stuck them up himself the very next day). 

Yeah, he spoils the kid. Whatever. If Peter doesn’t deserve it, who does?

“Hey,” smiles Peter, tilted gravity pulling the small, endearing locks of hair at his forehead across his eyes, which are bright with an inexplicable curiosity at Tony’s mere presence in the room.

_Pepper’s right. He’s at home._

Tony’s heart clangs a warning in his chest, a warning he’s certain is utter bullshit, and yet he can’t ignore it.

Sitting up with an almost startlingly abrupt movement, Peter briefly wiggles his jaw from side to side in a gesture that seems to belie his nerves. “So, uh… what’s up?”

If there’s one thing Tony’s glad about, it’s that the bed doesn’t creak as he sits heavily beside the kid. Suddenly, the small things have become startlingly momentous. Like the anticipatory glint in Peter’s eye – almost as if he _knows_.

“Kid,” Tony begins. For one reason or another, his body’s rationing breath and refusing to release it in speech.

“Tony,” Peter mimics, humouring him and attempting to gauge his mood at once.

“You like it here, right?”

“Yeah. Of course. This is- this is great.” Twisting his head briefly to indicate the warmly-lit room, Peter’s mouth twitches upwards ruefully.

Tony could punch himself. Peter’s giving him ample chance to come out and _say something_ , but he’s frozen in his tracks.

After too many moments of silence watching Peter’s eyebrows climb higher and higher, Tony plants the knuckles of one hand in the palm of the other, close to growling in frustration. “Look, Pete. I’ve put this off for – probably way too long, but I wasn’t sure if you were ready to move on yet and… I’m gonna be honest, I was scared. But…”

Something in him bites off his next sentence in favour of gazing dumbly down at the kid, who quietly supplies, “It’s alright, Mister Stark. You can say it.”

With hindsight, there’s _definitely_ something weird about that answer, but Tony’s so blindingly pumped through with adrenaline that it passes him by.

He swears there’s an audible click of his brain as the pieces fall into place. There, at last, are the words he’s been longing to say. The last brick in his dam has burst.

He’s ready.

“Pete, I love you so much. You have no _idea._ From the first damn time I met you, I loved you, and I’m- I’m only sorry that I didn’t show it for so long. And now all of this mess has gone down, and… I thought I might die seeing you the way you were when it was all still fresh. Seeing you hurting like that, it was _awful_. And that’s when I freaked, I guess. It had never occurred to me that we’d end up like this – I mean, I never thought I’d be able to manage keeping you alive when you came over to the Tower to help with new suit upgrades, let alone - you know – having you living here. Daily life. But I realised that I cared who was looking after you. If it couldn’t be your mom or dad, or Ben – or May – it had to be someone who loved you. It just took me a while to believe that, maybe, if you wanted me to…”

“You could?”

Peter’s staring up at him, a smile tugging one corner of his mouth, and _thank God he’s okay with it oh my God this could happen._

“Yeah. I could.” Tony returns the eye contact and finds himself locked in the bottomless hazel eyes of _his kid_ , exhaling an earnest honesty he hasn’t displayed in decades. “When I saw you fall… after that pizza debacle… even if I didn’t have it in me at the time, all I wanted to do was to pick that kid up and hug his demons away.”

The kid’s face crumples, but it’s not with grief, not this time.

“So – and the jury’s out on this, there’s no time limit on your decision, _if_ you want to make one – it would be my, uh – my pleasure? Fuck, I dunno. I mean. If you want, we can go ahead with… with adoption.”

For the longest time, Peter just gazes at him with the funniest look on his face, and Tony starts to dread what the response will be.

“Pete?” he prompts hesitantly, cocking his head.

Peter jumps back to life in an instant and swallows heavily as if he’s just gone through a full-body reboot.

“Yes.” Peter nods furiously, the fierce set fiercely though his eyes shine with an unspeakable intensity. “My answer… my answer’s now, and it’s yes.”

Tony blinks.

“Wha – you – I mean… okay.”

The answer actually bowls him over until the only thing he can think to do is thud gently back to recline against the wall.

Peter looks away briefly.

“Have you thought about it? At all?” Tony asks, disbelieving. _I know this is good news but… what the hell?_

It’s now that Peter turns around, hands clasped behind his back, and Tony knows _exactly_ what that look means. “Yeah. I did. Mostly while you and Miss Potts were talking about it.”

Tony jolts back upwards. “You heard that?”

“Superhearing. You had her on speakerphone for some reason. I couldn’t really… _not_ listen,” Peter protests behind small huffs of laughter.

Every ounce of the expectant tension coursing through Tony leaves him through the dramatic sigh he directs at the kid. “You little shit,” he gapes, not bothering to hide his undertone of affection.

“For the record, you totally need to put, like, all your money in the swear jar. _Parents_ should pay extra for swearing to their _kids_.”

And it’s a dumb joke, a stream of words directly out of Peter’s motormouth, but it stops him in his tracks for a moment because –

_I’m gonna be parent. I_ am _a parent, and this is my kid._

_My son._

Tony grabs at the kid and tucks his curls under his chin in a playful headlock. “Is that how it works now, huh?” he cackles, grinning ear to ear when Peter lets out peals of laughter, weakly attempting to break free.

“Uh huh,” the kid nods between breathless giggles. He stops squirming, laying limp across Tony’s lap, and speaks in a pantomime growl: “ _Give me all your mo-ney.”_

“Oh my God, I’m terrified,” Tony deadpans, snatching one of Peter’s hands from the covers and puppeteering the kid so his fingers are splayed across his eyes.

Gently tugging his hand from Tony’s, Peter sarcastically slow-claps, smile about as wide as it gets. “Academy award.”

“You’d better vote for me.”

“Why do you say that as if I wouldn’t?”

Tony gives in to the urge to brush a few over-long locks away from the kid’s face. “Because I know if either of those Call Me by Your Name guys were nominated, you’d pick them over me in a heartbeat.”

“You know me better than I know myself, I swear,” Peter insists; behind his bark of laughter, Tony’s flying. He adds, “I’d totally vote for Timothee Chalamet,” with a flippancy that’s spread too thinly to be subtle.

“Hey, kid,” cuts in Tony before the warmth of the moment before can derail too far. Peter meets his eye. “You know you can take it back if you want? The – about the adoption, I mean. If you change your mind all of a sudden, or… I don’t know, if it just feels too fast, or too big—”

“Tony.”

The word sounds strange, heavenly, from the mouth of the boy still laying across his knees. When Tony locks eyes with him and watches his lips pursing, he understands how _big_ this is – for the both of them.

“ _I want this_ ,” are Peter’s first simple words. “You don’t… you don’t have to worry that I don’t. Look, I – um… I asked Pepper about your dad.”

Tony stills.

“She said you get scared, sometimes – because he never did stuff for you, always for himself – so you’re scared you’ll do that to me. Among… a bunch of other things. Which I’ve noticed. But you’re not him. I don’t know if anyone ever… actually told you that?”

Tony’s eyes are hot. “No,” he murmurs as Peter shifts so he’s upright again, directing the searchlights of his eyes at his soon-to-be parent. “They, um… they didn’t.”

“Well,” Peter chips in, endearingly matter-of-fact, “I probably have the most reputable opinion of anyone you know in this area. Right?”

Humouring his kid, Tony offers a small, bemused nod.

“And I know you’re not like him. You care about what I think and what I want. Sometimes you go, like, _too_ far to do little things for me and I have to remind myself you don’t have normal working hours.” Peter allows himself a small snort of laughter before ploughing on. “Uh… you give me the nice pears from the bowl and eat the gross ones yourself. Yeah. From what Pepper said, that’s not what your dad did. So… when you adopt me, maybe you could try to just - let go of him and just be you? I mean…”

With a sigh that seems born half of frustration and half of embarrassment, he casts his eyes to his hands. “You know what, that was weird – I – I phrased it wrong, I didn’t mean to… disrespect him or anything…”

“No, Pete,” breathes Tony. “That’s… that’s really great advice.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. I’m gonna be one hundred percent Tony from now on.”

“Okay.” Peter grins devilishly, already yet another step ahead of Tony, and continues cryptically: “So you’re Tony, and I’m…”

“What?”

“My name’s…”

_Oh. Now_ Tony gets it. “Goddamnit, kid.” He can’t quite wipe the dumb grin off his face as he pushes the wide-eyed teenager away with his fingertips in a show of indifference.

Peter shakes his head, indicating himself slowly with a hopeful hint of a smile. “Not ‘kid’. Pe-…”

And – come on, the kid gave up a boundary for him, so it only makes sense that Tony does the same. Plus, he’s totally busting out the puppy eyes, which work like hypnosis on Tony, whether Peter’s aware of it or not.

“ _Peter._ ”

The kid seems almost surprised he’d said it. “Yeah,” he whispers, face suddenly overrun with emotion.

The swell of affection pressing against Tony’s sternum is potent enough to compel him to wrap his arms around Peter, who instantly melts into the embrace. “And you’re my kid,” he adds, nudging Peter’s temple softly with his own.

“Yeah.” Peter’s voice is the voice of someone who’s definitely tearing up right about now, but Tony decides not to mention it.

Ten seconds later, they’re still there, Tony wondering whether to close his eyes or continue to gaze out at the drifts of autumn leaves stirring outside the window and coming to the conclusion that he doesn’t care.

It’s only hours later that he realises he hadn’t hesitated for a moment to enclose his kid in his arms.

\--

_Four months later_

\--

“Tony, I kinda… could you help me out?”

“What’s up?”

Yes, Tony’s seen the suit Peter’s wearing multiple times while it was fitted, but it doesn’t change the way it feels to watch the kid walk through the door in it. Midnight blue, simple, white shirt underneath. Somehow, Peter manages to appear younger and older than his years simultaneously, the nervous grin ghosting his face at odds with the overload of gel he’s slicked back his hair with.

Then Tony notices the tie and his jaw clicks shut.

“I haven’t done a Windsor in, like, forever.” Peter chuckles sheepishly, the significance of the clumsily-knotted tie completely lost on him.

That day in July has unwittingly haunted him for too long, and in this moment the universe seems to be extending towards him a chance to plaster over the memory with a new one.

_Times really have changed._

Reaching out a hand charged with anticipation – for what this next moment and day will change between them – Tony eases apart the mess of a knot.

“No, my hard work.” Peter barely feigns annoyance through his smile.

“If you’re that set on getting it right, I’ll teach you,” Tony huffs fondly, beginning to describe each step as he winds a Windsor into the deep blue tie. The trusting pools of brown just beneath his own study the movements of his hands with intent. “Wider end over thinner. Then put it under. Over again. Poke it up through the gap here so it’s in front, then tuck it under the loop you made.”

“…right?”

“You didn’t get it, did you?” Tony smirks.

“Not really.”

A few small tugs and the knot is secure. “Well, we’re cutting it pretty fine, so lessons will have to wait for now.”

Peter nods, halfway to dashing back out of the room. “Okay, I gotta—”

“Hey, wait a second. I wanna take a good look at you.” With his hands planted on the kid’s shoulders, he steers him back round, taking in the clean-cut lines of his soon-to-be son. To be more precise, the kid he’s going to adopt today.

_Still not over that in the slightest. Don’t think I even want to be._

“Hey, you didn’t ask for help with… this.” Tony indicates the kid’s severe hairstyle with thinly veiled distaste.

“Yeah, because I could do it myself. I’m not six.” Peter meets Tony’s eyes with eyebrows raised, before groaning. “You wanted me to keep the curls, didn’t you?”

Tony can’t hold back any longer from mussing up the kid’s hair. “They’re so _cute_.”

In a valiant but fruitless effort, Peter ducks away from Tony’s searching hands, re-slicking down errant locks while he protests, “It’s a _court appearance_. I wanna look smart, not _cute_.”

“Trust me, when you see the court photos in a decade’s time, you’ll be thankful I stood up for the curls.”

“No, I’m pretty sure I won’t!”

By the time Peter’s finally wriggled out of Tony’s grip, his hair is well and truly ruined, stiff half-curls springing out from his head at every angle.

Tony winces. “Yeah, I’ll admit that my love for the curls may have outrun logic for a second.”

“Oh, God. What now?”

“We still have five minutes. Quick wash and dry – and no gel, for the good of us both.”

Just before the kid can run out again, Tony hooks an arm around his shoulders and drops a kiss to his furrowed forehead. Then he gives him a light nudge out of the door. “Go on.”

\--

Pepper, Rhodey, Happy, Ned, MJ and a few of Tony’s close employees and friends are the lucky few privy to the highly-guarded adoption. Judge Lambert was carefully chosen as the most reputable and generally the _nicest_ in the business, and the entire legal team was similarly hand-picked by Tony and Happy to ensure the process went as smoothly as possible.

And, for once, neither Tony nor Peter’s bad luck seems to have touched this momentous proceeding.

“Family court is important work,” the judge begins as she stands before the small desk Tony sits at, Peter at his side. Before them lies the stack of papers that will determine their future. “But it’s difficult work. We spend much of our time dealing with things we feel nobody should have to go through.”

Peter surreptitiously shuffles his chair closer to Tony, who lays a hand over the kid’s and gently squeezes.

“So, on these rare days when we get to smile at work… these days mean a great deal to all of us.” Judge Lambert directs her own warm smile at them both. “I’d like to thank you both for making this day so happy for us, and we wish you much more joy in the time you spend together.”

Briefly craning his neck to catch a glimpse of the rows of benches behind them, Tony meets Rhodey’s barely-concealed grin and Pepper’s uncharacteristically cheesy thumbs-up.

“Today we will be signing some final paperwork and asking some questions.”

Peter nods attentively.

“Mister Stark, Peter, would you both please sign and date this adoption agreement if you are in accordance with the terms and conditions.”

Tony’s signature is efficient, well-practiced, while Peter’s takes him thirty seconds with the tip of his tongue peeping from between his lips in concentration. Judge Lambert grins fondly; Tony knows exactly what she’s thinking and understands all too well.

Once the paperwork is completed, she takes a seat in front of them both.

“Tony Stark,” she asks, looking him stoically in the eye, “Do you wish to adopt Peter Parker?”

_This is it._

“Yes, Your Honour.” He sends a grin to Peter, who seems to be physically restraining his excitement by the way he’s aggressively thrust his hands between his thighs. “Without a shadow of a doubt.” The responding smile splits open the kid’s face.

Now looking the kid in the eye with a slightly softer glance, Judge Lambert says, “Peter Parker, would you like Tony to be your dad?”

“Yeah,” Peter responds through a wavering voice. Then he tearfully tacks on: “Totally.”

The warm laugh that spreads around the courtroom reaches even the otherwise silent stenographer. Peter ducks his head with a bashful smile.

The judge indicates a final document with her crooked grin. “This is the adoption order. By signing this document, I hereby declare you… _totally_ parent and child under the law. Congratulations.”

Tony knows that it’s Pepper who starts the applause.

With a burst of laughter, Peter dives into Tony, who hides the tears he doesn’t yet know how to acknowledge behind the kid’s neck.

“That’s it, kiddo,” he whispers, unable and unwilling to wipe the joy from his tone. “Guess you’re stuck with me now.”

All Peter says is, “Tony. _Tony._ ”

\--

“Okay, kid. You know the drill.”

“Yup.”

“If it gets too much, promise me you’ll let me know? I can get Happy to get you out of there just like that.”

“Okay. I will. But I want to stay with you for the statement.”

“I know, bud. I’m just giving you a way out in case it all goes to hell.”

“Well, thank you.”

Tony wishes there was another damn way to put the rumours to rest, but here they are. The least he can do is ease Peter into his new life under public scrutiny.

Despite it all, there’s a small part of him that’s hopeful – excited, even - to reveal his new kid to the world, to make the statement with his son by his side.

“How are you feeling?” he prompts the kid, hands circling his shoulders.

Peter is tense but upright beneath his grip. “A little nervous, but – that’s normal, right?”

“Yeah, of course.” Carding a final hand through Peter’s curls, Tony forces a lopsided smile. “Ready?”

“Ready.”

Tony pushes open the ornate doors and greets the hell that lies on the other side.

An overwhelmingly large crowd strains desperately against a plastic barricade, some brandishing handheld cameras or steadying larger ones on tripods, many holding phones, a few already scribbling on notepads, all seething like one greedy entity. The sheer volume of shouts and flashes only confounds Tony for a moment, but he can only imagine the effect it’s having on Peter. Sure enough, the kid has paled beside him, the subtle shifting in his lower lip indicating to Tony that he’s chewing nervously at it.

With a gentle hand on the small of his back, Tony guides him towards the clump of microphones attached to a lectern a few feet from the front of the clamouring crowd.

It’s only then that he starts to hear what’s being yelled at them.

“Here comes the happy couple!”

“Mister Stark, are you here to confirm or deny the rumours that you and Peter Parker are dating?”

“Peter, we’d love a moment of your time to get _your_ perspective on your relationship with Mister Stark!”

“You’re sixteen, aren’t you, Peter? Tell me, how good is your new _dad_ at counting?”

“The great Tony Stark has found a new plaything, folks!”

“Come on, Peter, give us a smile!”

“I won’t believe it until they kiss.”

“This is gonna go viral. They’re totally together, haven’t you seen them hugging all the time?”

“Mister Stark, don’t you think that publicising your illegal romance with a minor is a bad move?”

“Hey, Peter, how did it feel to lose your only relative in such a tragic accident?”

Tony spends too long simply attempting to take the chaos in. He’s jolted back to reality when a warm weight collides with him and he blinks away the static in his brain to notice that Peter’s turned into him and burrowed into the lapel of his suit to block out the commotion, the force of his ducked head hitting his shoulder sending Tony a step backwards.

Without conscious thought, his hands fly upwards to cover the kid’s over-sensitive ears, the tips of his fingers combing small strands of hair soothingly against his head.

“Hey,” he says, jaw tight; the roar of the crowd barely lowers. “Hey! I came to make a statement, not listen to your disgusting comments."

Finally, the onlookers fall silent. He notices a few cameramen zooming in on Peter as he clings to him.

“Now, has anyone got an appropriate question or are you all gonna go on hassling me and my kid?” Tony asks, forcing a deadpan tone into words he wishes he could inject all the venom in the world into. His hackles have been well and truly raised; even when Peter emerges from where he’d shoved his face into Tony’s collarbone, cheeks flushed in a hybrid of bewilderment and embarrassment, he’ll admit that he feels pretty murderous. _Nobody gets to heckle my kid._

With a few hesitant jerks of his head, the kid chances a look at his audience, still glued to Tony’s side, and that’s where the trouble starts.

“Peter,” calls a woman towards the back of the mass, jostling against her competitors, and Peter turns towards her with an attentiveness that’s pure politeness. “Did you have a say in the adoption?”

Watching Peter’s brow furrow innocently, knowing that he’ll lose that endearing confusion the more times he endures this and comes to know the lies of the press like they’re his own, makes Tony’s blood boil.

“Tony doesn’t exactly seem the nurturing type. Tell me, is it all for show?”

Peter’s mouth opens and closes a few times before he sounds an answer, but when he does, it’s with a sudden lurch towards the lectern and away from Tony. “No, of- of course not. I did – I- I did have a say in it.”

At the sudden bout of stuttering, he blushes red, but the roiling noise among the crowd has risen again and, determined to make his point, he shouts over them. “I did have a say in it!”

Silence. Tony edges a little closer to the kid in the hope that he’s near enough to offer some physical support. This isn’t the way he’d imagined the statement would turn out, but he won’t interrupt Peter if he’s got something to say.

Plus, it makes him mushy in the best way when Peter sticks up for him.

“I wanted – I _chose_ him, okay?” stumbles Peter, thumb rubbing rapidly back and forth across the lectern in his passion, and Tony melts. “He was there when everyone else was gone. My…”

Gulping in a breath, the kid ploughs on with an increasing unsteadiness to his tone, and Tony begins to plan what he’ll do if the kid gets overwhelmed as it becomes increasingly likely.

“My parents died when I was six. My- my uncle when I was…. thirteen – then my aunt. I had – I had _nobody_ , but he was there. He was – you – you don’t understand. You don’t under _stand_.”

When the first tear escapes the corner of his eye, Peter does a double take, seeming shocked to discover it's there, and turns away from the podium, seeking Tony’s eyes with too much desperation to be casual.

And the crowd is lapping it up.

_Okay, time to step in._

“Hey.” Reaching for the sides of the kid’s arms, Tony takes a few brisk steps forward and eases him back so he’s effectively shielding the kid from the cameras. Peter’s beginning to crumple in on himself. “Kid,” he mutters urgently, searching for his kid’s eyes. “Pete. Don’t look at them. It’s just you and me, okay?” The kid responds with the smallest of nods; Tony brushes the damp from his eyes with a thumb and asks, “How do you find X in a quadratic equation?”

Inhaling shakily, Peter locks his eyes on Tony’s and dutifully recites, “X equals minus b plus or minus the square root of b squared, minus 4 A C, all over 2 A.”

“Great. One more time?”

“X equals—”

For a moment, he pauses as Tony pulls him into a tight hug.

“X equals minus b plus or minus the square root of b squared, minus 4 A C, all over 2 A,” Peter says a little louder, voice muffled against the suit his face is pressed against, and even Tony feels a little calmer despite the roar of the crowd at their backs.

“Okay. Good.” With a swift movement, Tony holds the kid back out at arm’s length, still standing tall to block the cameras from getting at him. “Happy’s right around the corner. Should I get him to pick you up?”

But Peter shakes his head. “I’m sorry. I’m messing it all up.”

“No, kiddo. You were brave. It’s those guys that’re messing it up, alright?”

The half-smile Peter cracks is going to have to do for now.

“I’m gonna give ‘em hell. Just stick with me.”

A nod from the kid. Tony turns, clicks his tongue against the roof of his mouth, throws a wordless glare to the masses in front of them.

Silence settles.

“Alright, you’ve all had your questions. Let me ask you one. What the hell gave you the impression that we’re dating?”

Peter flinches just slightly at his side at the bluntness of the statement. The sudden quiet of the reporters and onlookers is almost comedic.

“Nobody?” Tony reiterates.

A hesitant voice calls from their left. “You have been spotted displaying a lot of… physical affection. In public.”

_Oh, so_ that’s _it._

Leaning closer to the microphones, Tony raises his voice just a little. “Well, I believe you all are very much mistaken in your _theories._ ”

Half-hidden behind Tony, Peter watches with wide eyes as the audience hang their collective heads like puppets controlled by the man at the podium above them all.

“Let me tell you just a little about my dad. He was a great inventor. His hands created – but they didn’t hold. It is _not_ healthy for a kid to go through life without that constant of reassurance. Peter’s right. You really _don’t_ understand.”

Tony catches himself at the sight of the kid gazing up at him with an awe that blows him away. The way his head is tilted inexplicably reminds him of a dark January night when Peter had coerced him into watching The Last Jedi, when he’d watched Rose lay back in her burnt-out speeder and say, _“That’s how we’re gonna win. Not fighting what we hate – saving what we love.”_

He’d looked to his side and found the kid gazing over at him with that same look in his eyes as the woman on screen, and the world had started to make a little more sense.

_Saving what we love._

“Here’s a little advice,” continues Tony, tugging Peter closer with a coaxing hand, “Hug your sons. Hug your dads. Your male friends and relatives and co-workers. Show them you care instead of shutting off physical contact to preserve shitty, antiquated gender expectations – and you might end up with a kid as good as this one.”

For a few moments, silence reigns, and as Tony begins to take in the stunned faces of the people before him, he wonders if he’s gone too far.

It’s not until Peter barrels into him and pulls him into an embrace that the cheering begins.

“That was so cool,” he hears at his collarbone, Peter’s voice rising above the noise. The sea of reporters, once so villainous, has become a clapping crowd of supporters.

Seeing the positive reaction to his statement, Tony doesn’t hesitate to curl his arms around the kid, stifling a triumphant grin against newly-washed curls.

“Oh, and I adopted him just now, by the way,” adds Tony to the microphones, earning a rise in the cheers. He feels rather than hears Peter burst into a giggle.

Rocking the kid gently back and forth to the music of applause, Tony wonders if this is what it’s all gonna be like now. The world’s flipped upside down since the day he’d sat uselessly by Peter’s side, fishing out that pack of damn cookies like it would stop the stream of tears from escaping the kid’s soul. _He’s_ changed just as much. _Times have changed,_ he’d told Peter, and they will keep changing. Later, he’ll ask Pepper for his hand and Peter will run around the corner in a fit of excitement when she agrees, having eavesdropped – _with_ Tony’s prior knowledge this time – on the whole thing. The ever-turning hands of time might seem to split them apart when Peter packs his bag for college and prises himself away from his parents with noise-cancelling headphones still ringing his neck, but Tony will know that to let him fly, he has to let him go.

And the one thing time will never discount is the love with which Tony presses a kiss to the crown of Peter’s head.

“I love you, kid,” he says with a smile.

Peter looks up at him and swallows, before saying, “I love you too.”

Finally, he realises how he will win. Not by fighting what he hates but _saving who he loves._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't believe this is the end of the road!! Thank you, everyone, for your beautiful comments, and for simply reading! We're both eternally grateful for every ounce of support we recieve.  
> We'll see you soon with new projects!  
> \- Daisy & Kaleb


End file.
